zicHun's weblog

What I found in QD31.3 Sis 2006, University chemistry / Peter E. Siska.

2007-03-21T15:20:00.000+08:00

Schroedinger, Erwin! Professor of physics!
Wrote daring equations! Confounded his critics!
(Not bad, eh? Don't worry. This part of the verse
Starts off pretty good, but it gets a lot worse.)
Win saw that the theory that Newton'd invented
By Einstein's discov'ries had been badly dented.
What now? wailed his colleagues. Said Erwin, "Don't panic,
No grease monkey I, but a quantum mechanic.
Consider electrons. Now, these teeny articles
Are sometimes like waves, and then sometimes like particles.
If that's not confusing, the nuclear dance
Of electrons and suchlike is governed by chance!
No sweat, though--my theory permits us to judge
Where some of 'em is and the rest of 'em was."
Not everyone bought this. It threatened to wreck
The comforting linkage of cause and effect.
E'en Einstein had doubts, and so Schroedinger tried
To tell him what quantum mechanics implied.
Said Win to Al, "Brother, suppose we've a cat,
And inside a tube we have put that cat at--
Along with a solitaire deck and some Fritos,
A bottle of Night Train, a couple mosquitoes
(Or something else rhyming) and, oh, if you got 'em,
One vial prussic acid, one decaying ottom
Or atom--whatever--but when it emits,
A trigger device blasts the vial into bits
Which snuffs our poor kitty. The odds of this crime
Are 50 to 50 per hour each time.
The cylinder's sealed. The hour's passed away. Is
Our pussy still purring--or pushing up daisies?
Now, you'd say the cat either lives or it don't
But quantum mechanics is stubborn and won't.
Statistically speaking, the cat (goes the joke),
Is half a cat breathing and half a cat croaked.
To some this may seem a ridiculous split,
But quantum mechanics must answer, "Tough @#&!
We may not know much, but one thing's fo' sho':
There's things in the cosmos that we cannot know.
Shine light on electrons--you'll cause them to swerve.
The act of observing disturbs the observed--
Which ruins your test. But then if there's no testing
To see if a particle's moving or resting
Why try to conjecture? Pure useless endeavor!
We know probability--certainty, never.'
The effect of this notion? I very much fear
'Twill make doubtful all things that were formerly clear.
Till soon the cat doctors will say in reports,
"We've just flipped a coin and we've learned he's a corpse."'
So saith Herr Erwin. Quoth Albert, "You're nuts.
God doesn't play dice with the universe, putz.
I'll prove it!" he said, and the Lord knows he tried--
In vain--until fin'ly he more or less died.
Win spoke at the funeral: "Listen, dear friends,
Sweet Al was my buddy. I must make amends.
Though he doubted my theory, I'll say of this saint:
Ten-to-one he's in heaven--but five bucks says he ain't."

-Cecil Adams, The Straight Dope
(Taken from http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html)

...

Sometimes, just sometimes, in rare moments like these, I wonder if I should've majored in Physics instead of Life Sciences... but in any case, I KNOW I'm in the right faculty. I feel like I'm slowly getting acquainted with and inducted into a fraternity of the intellectual and quirky... and I think... I like what I see!

Welcome to NUS part II

2006-12-02T17:33:00.000+08:00

Hi, it's been a really long time since I last updated this blog huh? Sorry man, I've been so overwhelmed these past four months in university, I hardly had the time for anything but CCAs and mugging (and wasting my time playing silly games in response to having to study so much. I'll explain this some other time, if ever).

First of all, I must concede that I had a joyfully eventful time at NUS. I say this with reservation because I entered NUS in an extremely jaded and cynical frame of mind. Having graduated from over 10 years of MOE education and 2 years of SAF education (well, depending on how you look at it, ANYTHING can be considered education), I fully expected NUS to be what all other local institutions had thus far been: full of 'wayang' and no substance.

And so it was that after a few weeks, I began to find that NUS wasn't really as bad as they claimed it to be after all. Sure, there is a general air of 'muggerism' and a pervading 'study for the sake of exams' kind of attitude among the student population, but I began to notice that this kind of attitude was prevalent in overseas universities in US and UK too, apparently. And I must concede that I was quite impressed with the infrastructure provided by NUS; the buses, the internet, the IVLE (I was especially surprised that the IVLE forums and many other functions were being so well-utilised, for I had thought IVLE was like some sort of technological white elephant), etc...

Maybe such 'standards' are all but an expected minimum for a 'Top 50' institute of tertiary education in the world, but having come from a purported top junior college and secondary school which offered nothing close, I guess it's reasonable for me to be dazzled.

Of course, academically speaking, I also felt that actually, the standard of the lecturers in NUS wasn't all that bad as they claimed. There were good professors who were not only good academics, but also good educators. Perhaps I was fortunate to have picked the right modules (I accidentally picked a law module, which turned out to be quite my most enjoyable module so far), but I thought the professors really sought to get us students to learn something, to truly educate.

Having said all that, what truly brought me joy nevertheless, I think, was staying in on campus. If you think about it, the reason why an overseas education is so sought after is really because it widens one's horizons. Someone who's studied half the globe away for 3-4 years looks at the world in different eyes I guess. And living independently away from home is one of these intangible educating mechanisms. So for me, I was pursuing an overseas education at NUS for the 5 days I was away from home, free to be whoever I wanted to be.

Until the exams loomed around the corner, and I chickened out and went home on some of the weekdays.

As for the many events that transpired during my stay at KEVII Hall, I don't think I'll be able to find the time to write about them properly on this blog. To give a rough idea of the kind of life I led in hall, firstly, I think I lived in quite a spartan manner, having only ever gone for supper at Fong Seng once (on 16th November, the day of many firsts), and not having depended on any snacks or 'dietary supplements' in my room except milo. Until the examination period when cup noodles and chocolates made their way onto my shelves.

Secondly, I've joined KEVII Hallplay, being delegated the role of lights I/C (because the original lights I/C, an experienced lights person, decided to sign up to be assistant production manager, and then asked me to take over his job). I'm with the road relay (ie, a jogging CCA), as well as the publications committee.

Lastly, in this intensive starting four months at NUS, I was with the Varsity Christian Fellowship at KEVII, and through it all, God was abundant in His grace and mercy to me.

Well, I hate to admit it, but I think university looks like it's going to be quite an exciting chapter of my life.

Brainwashing @ Civil Service College

2006-07-26T21:14:00.000+08:00

I attended a brainwashing session (which they called an MOE Induction Programme) at the Civil Service College last Thursday. The brainwashing was quite thorough. Before tea, there was an engaging talk on the big picture of our educational landscape by a very sharp and knowledgeable lady which opened my mind. And after tea, there was an inspiring speech by the Principal-designate of Northlight School (http://my.asia1.com/sub/budget2006/story/0,6634,376446,00.html) that tugged at my heart.

I'm a very slow person. My friends used to say that to make me laugh on Monday, they've got to tell me the joke the previous Friday. It seems that when it comes to brainwashing, I'm even slower. A good one week after all the talks, whilst I was on the bus to SAFRA to sign up for the Sheares Bridge Run, the effects of the brainwashing began; I started thinking about education, and I felt like some ideas just dropped into my head:

One of the main aims of an education system in a society is to produce citizens, regardless of social status, to be well-equipped to contribute back to society; to produce citizens who can and will be appropriately useful to society. So an education should produce good doctors, good teachers, good chefs, good technicians, good labourers... good everythings.

From a secular point of view, a person can be said to have led a meaningful and purposeful life if he or she has contributed to the general betterment of the society. Great people discover cures and vaccines to diseases that save millions of life and improve the medical standards of society. Not-so-great people can make a child's day by being gentle and understanding when administering that painful injection and thus also improve the medical standards of society as well. If both the above doctor and the nurse keep doing what they do, they can be said to be leading a useful life.

I think people in general, if given a choice, would prefer to lead a useful and thus, meaningful life, to know that what one is doing is actually beneficial to at least one other person other than oneself. And then I realised that, from a Christian perspective, this was because man was made in the image of God, and God, as manifested in Jesus, was a humble servant; Man was made (not primarily, though) to serve.

Of course, very often, the pragmatic realities of life set in, and ambition and material pursuits take precedence. I know a senior who's now a lawyer. She tells me she was full of idealism just after she graduated and wanted to be a good lawyer, but now she is just a glorified clerk with paperwork up to her neck and was struggling just to clear her 'in' tray consistently. For people like her, I suppose it seems that the greater good of society has no place nor importance in their lives. Material success and financial well-being becomes paramount.

Some people under such circumstances succeed in achieving their new goals, whilst others fail. However, at the end of the day, whether they lead a contented and happy life actually doesn't depend on the extent of their success. Human avarice is limitless. Material success cannot satisfy because there's never enough. However, knowing that you've contributed to the progress of society, or an organisation, or even just someone else apart from yourself, would bring meaning and purpose to one's life. And to be able to, at the end of the day, feel that there's currently meaning and purpose in your life, would make most people contented and happy.

The knowledge that one is a contributing part or member of a greater entity, and to see it achieve and progress beyond what any individual can do, that is what brings true joy in life. Examples that come into mind are orchestras, soccer teams, NPCC/NCC units, and society, and of course, the body of Christ. Thus, I'd go so far as to say that more than society needs its citizens to contribute to it, us citizens need to be able to contribute to society before we become complete and content.

And it is in schools where the required skills are taught, and it is up to the education planners of a society to determine how to allocate appropriate teaching of all the required skills in society so that everyone can be useful, so that there's no oversaturation nor shortfall of skilled workers in every sector of society.

...

Didn't realise that the aims of the education system in Singapore was actually THIS noble huh, did you?

Heh.

Soon, I'll be telling you about the virtues and achievements of the MOE and it's educational policies...

5078 CHEW ZICHUN Singapore 03:38:39

2006-07-06T02:38:00.000+08:00

3 hours 38 minutes and 39 seconds

That was how long I took to complete this year's OSIM Triathlon (1.5km swim, 40km cycle, 10km run) at East Coast Park last Sunday. To put my timing into perspective, click on the link below, and scroll all the way to the bottom, 65 would be a helpful number in case you can't find my name, hehe...

http://jsp.triathlonsingapore.org/news_events/events_results/ost2006/sunday/Osim_Sun_AGE_%20GroupM20.htm

Well, if you're wondering why I'm so elated (actually, I'm not just elated, I'm absolutely ecstatic) about coming in 5th last for my age group, then you will have to see my results last year to understand why:

http://www.singaporetriathlon.com/results/2005/results/Age_Group_Results_CategoryM20.htm

And to put THAT into perspective, you will have to check the results of EVERYONE ELSE who took part in the Olympic Distance Triathlon, and try to find the number of people who actually came in slower than me. Notice that the age group goes all the way up to 50, 55, and even 60+ for males? Yes, among all the uncles and aunties, there were only a grand total of 3 (I counted many times, last year and this year) people who were slower than me!

When I started the run this year, I was only aiming to finish the race this time just under 4 hours, so that I could tell people I finished a triathlon in '3 hours something', ie barely under 4 hours. And also, so that based on last year's results, I would at least not come in last for my age group. So having 'aimed low', I am thus extremely delighted to have shaved a good 43 minutes off my timing as compared to last year! That is a whopping 16.5% reduction in my timing!

And to top it all off, this year's race has been extremely eventful (in a masochistically humourous way), and looking back, I think this timing would very likely be the best performance I'll ever be able to squeeze out with my current (low) fitness level. Let me begin to describe in more detail how the race unfolded for me:

1st Leg: 1.5km Swim along East Coast Beach
(2 laps of 375m out into the sea and back)

The first thing that greets you when you plunge headfirst into the brownish algae green waters off East Coast Beach is the jolting taste of regurgitated vomit in your mouth. You can barely see your own arms ahead of you as you swim in the murky waters. So it was like that, with the barrage of the oft-described 'flailing arms and legs', that I quickly ended up swimming at the back, and struggling unsuccessfully to keep up with very many people.

During the first lap, as I was swimming back to shore, my swimming cap started to come off. Unable to adjust it back into place, I took it off altogether, along with my goggles, and tried to put it properly back on again. I spent a good 3-4 minutes before I finally succeeded, but as I had put my cap on too tight over my forehead, I wasn't able to put on my goggles properly, and till I reached the shore, my right goggle was filled with water.

During the second lap, my swimming cap problem was resolved at the shore. However, due to the choppiness of the sea, and the fact that I used breaststroke to swim, I began to feel rather seasick. Having also accidentally swallowed a few mouthfuls of that horrid liquid, I was really on the verge of puking. There and then, the words 'fall out' kept coming mysteriously into my consciousness. Fortunately, they were unheeded.

2nd Leg: 40km Cycle along East Coast Park Service Road
(4 laps of 5km to the end of ECP Service Road and back)

I still remember vividly how, last year, on a borrowed mountain bike (from my cousin), I really struggled to complete the 40km. I ran out of water very quickly, and even had to come off the bike and ask a police marshaler for bottled mineral water. My thighs were experiencing sharp pains towards the third and fourth laps. My morale was experiencing sharp pains as well because every single encounter with another bicycle was my being overtaken. I did not overtake nor manage to keep up with a single cyclist! Naturally, into my 3rd and 4th round, I was mostly the only left on the whole cycling circuit. It was extremely demoralising.

This year, I rented a bicycle from one of those shops along East Coast Park. It was mountain bike with smooth wheels, sort of like a half-breed between mountain bikes and proper racer bikes. With that bike, I managed to keep up with and eventually overtake a Malay uncle on a racer, a young man on mountain bike, and a friendly chinese uncle on a racer in turn. We'd overtake each other every 2-3 minutes, until I'd overtake them and not see them again. There were of course, this time, many other cyclists I overtook once, and permanently, which did wonders to my morale this year.

The best part, however, was being able to see the clock at the end of each lap, because I could tell exactly how long I took for that lap. After my second lap, I realised, with an extended loud cheer to myself (which is as much of a celebration as I could afford, being on a bicycle and not knowing how to balance myself with both hands away from the handlebar), that I was taking 22 minutes for each lap! So throughout rest of the cycling leg, I kept calculating to confirm that should I maintain at this speed, I would finish the cycling leg 30 minutes faster than last year, and all I needed to do was to maintain the rest of my timings to achieve my goal! I would grin happily to myself every time after I finished calculating, and then proceed to calculate again to confirm that I was right.

3rd Leg: 10km Run along East Coast Park
(2 laps of 2.5km to Singapore Tennis Centre and back)

Last year, I took one too many cups of the gassy H20 that the well-meaning marshalers offered me as I jogged. So after my first round, my stomache was fizzing uncomfortably, and I just could not maintain a jog for more than 2 minutes, and ended up walking for most of the 10km. This year, I think the organisers must've realised how silly it was to provide gassy isotonic drinks, so they gave non-gassy H2O instead.

So my excuse for this year is that almost right after I started jogging, the muscles above my right knee began to cramp. I could only limp as quickly as I could, until my left knee started to cramp as well. Thus I was reduced to a slower walk for the next 5 minutes, after which, I tried to run again for the next few minutes and the cycle began again. My muscles were really taking turns to cramp, because I'd feel a new muscle begin to cramp along with all the old ones every time.

So I began to whisper many words of prayer, as well as drink up as much H20 as I could along the way.

Miraculously, after trudging past the first lap in this manner, I was somehow able to continuously jog at a steady pace for the last 5km of the race, without feeling even a hint of my muscles threatening to cramp, until I started to speed up towards the end. Nevertheless, I actually managed to work into sprint at the finish line that captured the attention of the commentator, inducing him, to my chagrin, to announce: "Coming in next... AND working INTO a fantastic sprint, is an individual! It is... Choo Zee Choon at the finish line!!!"

...

Well, should I manage to discipline myself into training regularly during my time in university, I think the annual OSIM triathlon is very much going to be an annual party for the few of us (Zhi Xian, Rui Jie, if he comes back, other friends and me). And I know where that $500 'CCA Subsidy' of my scholarship is going to go... a proper racer bike.

MOE Scholarship Dreams

2006-06-30T12:09:00.000+08:00

The MOE building has very fascinating lifts for a technological ignoramus like me: You press the floor number you want to go to at the lift lobby. When a lift door opens, an LCD panel just inside the lift door will indicate which floors it will stop at. And so to reach the floor you want to go to, you have to enter a lift that says it will go to that particular floor. From what I recall, there're no buttons in the lift, so I gather that if you forget to alight at your destination, you could very well be stuck in the lift until someone outside rescues you.

I made it there and back without any mishaps in the lift on Wednesday to attend the MOE meet-up session for us MOE Teaching Scholars. It was basically a get-to-know-you session, complete with *gasp* ice breaker games for the recipients of the scholarship as well as a briefing for some administrative matters. Many relevant personnel also had a turn at speaking; the OBS instructor and her briefing, a senior and her experience sharing, two NUS professors and their promoting of some of their programmes.

Having been briskly acquainted with the lot of Teaching Scholars, I couldn't help detecting this general aura of idealistic enthusiasm in the air, exuding from both the scholars and the speakers. I could see a subtle tingle of invincibility in some of the scholars' eyes. And words like 'Global' and 'Achievements', or 'Meaningful' and 'Enriching' kept popping up on the powerpoint screens or on the lips of the speakers. It seemed to me that by the end of the session at MOE, some of the scholars would have been sufficiently psyched into believing that they can come inspire a new generation of students, change the education system, and bring about World Peace.

"Crap lah, the MOE is just like SAF like that, got anything to say also must go through the proper channels and chain of command. You can't do very much. Want to change the screwed up education system? Forget it man." the few of us ORD'd blokes who later sat down at a nearby coffeeshop for lunch were, of course, too jaded and cynical to have been influenced by all that idealism, "eh Zichun, you okay not? You look a little sick."

I couldn't help feeling very sick after being immersed in that aura of unrealistic grandeur for a whole morning.

...

Actually, I had choked on a mint-flavoured menthos earlier, and I discovered there and then that having menthol in your windpipe was no joking matter. My whole face went red, I really couldn't breathe and speak. I had such terrible spasmic coughs that I thought I might have ruptured some blood vessels in my throat.

In reality, I believe most people can't manage to do very much in their lives. Every now and then, we hear of idealistic high-flying civil servants (or civil servants-to-be) that publicly (or privately) tell of their dreams of wanting to change the screwed-up system for the betterment of society. These people are usually top scholars (PSC, President's and beyond), and they usually end up having to later clarify that the system's not all that bad after all, or, if they didn't make their unrealistc claims too public, confess that, it turns out, there's nothing very much they could actually do.

How much less us second-tier scholars?

...

My answer to that is God.

No, I'm not trying to suggest that "with God as my divine weapon, I can hope to do all things great and glorious, and maybe, via a miracle, change the system according to what I think is right." Rather, the idea I'm trying to put forth is more along the lines of "now that I've realised how insignificant my own abilities are, I can suspend all faith and endeavour in my own human abilities, and instead, believe in and endeavour upon God and His plans."

Surely God has already made plans for the system if even us second-tier scholars can see the wide array of problems that plague it. However, I think firstly we have to accept that realistically speaking, there's probably nothing very much we as individuals can do to make any effective AND lasting changes. We may perhaps start something notable, or propagate something that's already been started. However, without Someone to plan and orchestrate everything, and equally importantly, many cooperative people who choose to follow, carry out and maintain this one single plan through the generations, we'd only very likely end up with many different imperfect plans carried out half-way, and nothing very much done.

In a world where everyone has good intentions, but are often hindered by pragmatic problems that often result in disillusionment and cynicism, God is the answer. And striving to be the willing and obedient servant and worker of God's plans, hardworking and humble; that is the best hope we can realistically harbour for the effective and lasting improvement of anything really.

Meanwhile, let me continue to hope that I will not get into any trouble with the intimidating lifts when I go back to MOE tomorrow to sign the contract.

My History Drama Script

2006-06-21T10:29:00.000+08:00

Presenting to you the script that I wrote for the History Drama Competition. Do note that this thing was written by a bumbling and angsty secondary two schoolboy who had too many ideas to effectively express them out properly. I suspect that most people will not appreciate most of the script's finer details. Heck, in fact, I think apart from the four of us who trashed out the stage directions, about everyone else could catch no ball.

Apart from some punctuation ammendments and spelling corrections, I've left the script almost completely unaltered; rhythmic and rhyming errors, grammatical mistakes, bad expressions and all.

Enjoy:

Once upon a time in the town of Singapore
Raffles made his port of call on her very shore
At that time the police had no officer in charge
So William Farquhar's son in law Francis James Bernard
Took the part time job of magistrate and attendant
Jailer, marine storekeeper and helper to the Resident
The police force then had twelve people in all
"Which is incompetent at catching thieves at all

And even if they catch the thieves" "Yes finally"
"The theieves with a bribe will still go scot-free
Because with a puny eight hundred a month
For me and all those under my command
A nice big bribe from the loot laden thief
For the poor policeman is more lucrative"
Therefore in the year of eighteen nineteen
The streets of Singapore were neither safe nor clean

Raffles thought that Singapore's conditions were ill
So he blamed Farquhar calling him "Imbecile"
Farquhar with a lot of tasks still undone
Had to, for law and order raise more funds
So he legalized opium smoking and gambling
With profits going to the force which was growing
Later in the year of nineteen forty-one
A magistrate was there to get things done

"Under me there was hundred twenty-eight
Loyal men who would anytime come to my aid
But alas even with these big strong men
The bad ways of the criminals I still cannot mend"
In eighteen forty-three by popular demand
Thomas Dunman was the first full-time chief in command
Dunman had difficulties which were immense
"Including a problem in the area of finance

Furthermore my men are overworked and underpaid
Buy luckily efforts to teach them were made
And by reducing the working hours that they had
Their morale was actually not that bad
In eighteen sevent-one due to to much pressure
Thomas Dunman made the decision to retire
As he left the office for the last time as boss
He left behind an efficient and humane police force

Twenty years after Thomas Dunman had retired
"A new uniform for us was created
It consisted of a blue serge coat and cap
And white trousers and black shoes to go with that"
The detective force in eighteen eighty-four
Was built to help uphold the law
And because the Chinese had a very bad experience
"Of corrupt policemen who had the license

To kill and rob and rape and steal
Our family's every single meal"
So not a single policeman
Was a local Chinese man
In eighteen nineteen a policeman must have thought
"These trousers that I wear are really hot
If I wear these trousers too long everyday
I might not get to celebrate Father's Day"

So he got the force to wear white khaki shorts
Which was cooler than the old trousers by lots
And thirteen years after they regained their fertility
In the very fateful year of nineteen o'three
The fingerprint system was introduced
So trouble in identifying thieves was reduced
In the next year of nineteen o'four
Before any Europeans in Singapore

Could even dream of being in the police force
Had to go through a special training course
The course required them to learn the local language
And take competitive exams "Hard as those from Cambridge"
The ISD was formed in nineteen nineteen
To arrest anyone who had even been
Thinking of anti-Singaporean plans
Or setting up chauvinistic communist bands

The marine traffic and communication branch
Was added to the force to add a bigger punch
"By the decade of nineteen thirty thanks to us
And our big police force of two thousand plus
Transformed the originally crime laden land
Into a place under the strong and mighty hand
Of justice to make it a land of peace
So that trading and profits will increase"

In the fateful year of nineteen forty-two
Yamashita wanted to have Singapore to rule
So with a "Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat"
Singapore was attacked by him just like that
But of course he had tens of thousands soldiers on his side
And with that thousands of Singaporeans died
Gen'rel Percieval couldn't take it anymore
So he decided to surrender Singapore

The original police force which had disbanded
In the war had now been restarted
Along with the force came the Kempetai
Whose orders no Singaporeans could defy
These two forces were corrupt and ruthless
And with them there was no justice or fairness
"Because if a bad but very rich man
Who decided that he wants to steal my hen

Will never be charged for theft in court
No matter how much proof I have got
Because if he bribes the judge with money
He will definitely go scot-free
And unluckily for me if I fail
To pay the fines the judge set I will go to jail"
Not only could the police control everyone's money
Their lives were also under their authority

And with the power that the police forces had
They terrorized the streets of Singapore quite bad
They murdered, robbed, killed and shot their very own peers
And that went on for many years
But finally in the year of nineteen forty-five
An atomic bomb hit Hiroshima leaving few alive
The bomb was made to launch by President Truman
"And the explosion was caused by nuclear fission"

"We had expected Japan to surrender
However all they did was to fight on harder
So let's drop another bomb on Nagasaki"
"I knew I shouldn't have studied chemistry"
So with that there was a very big sound "Kaboom"
And everyone in Nagasaki met their doom
So soon the Japanese in Singapore surrendered
And the Singapore Police Force and the Kempetai crumbled

The citizens of Singapore hated the force
And they even deliberately tried to break many laws
Police chief Colonel R.E Foulgar thought that it was bad
So he tried to rebuild the force with all that he had
His efforts were luckily for us a success
And soon the force started to make progress
In nineteen forty-one ten policewomen
Were hired so that in a situation

Involved the arresting of rowdy women
And searching of their bodies in case there's a weapon
No matter how much the women try to protest
They will never shout the very fearful word "Molest"
One year later due to one too many riots
The Riot Squad that suppressed riots were created
And till now it is still here due to all the good it's done
But now it's called the Special Operations Command

"Woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof"
"And that meant the police force did improve
Because in nineteen fifty-five dog units were set up
To help track down everything from criminals to a cub
The dogs helped in almost every single raid
And patrolled around houses though they were not paid"
In nineteen fifty-nine there were eighty officers
Out of which forty-seven were local members

NPCC was formed in nineteen fifty-nine
So students would think that being a policeman is fine
Bartley Secondary School was the pioneer
School that had police protection from the interior
In nineteen sixty-three Malaysie merged with Singapore
The name of the force was thus not the same as before
THe Royal Malaysian Police Force was its new name
And catching spies and saboteurs was its new game

In nineteen sixty-five we separated from Malaysia
And SM Lee even publicly shed a tear
Now its name was Polis Republik Singapura
And the MID controlled it from afar
In nineteen sixty-nine the policement changed their looks
"So that we could impress all including the crooks
The original dark-blue shirt and white khaki shorts
Were replaced with new all light blue uniform that were so hot"

The police force maintained its efficiency
And made Singapore a very safe country
In nineteen eighty-seven Mr Lim Kim San
Took over the MID and all of its fund
He introduced policement into the NS
Which certainly reaped a lot of success
"NPCC" Mr Lim Kim San was to say
"Is to be in every second'ry school as an ECA"

And so this is the brief history
Of the Singapore Police Authority
Now that you you have finished watching our production
We hope that you will look into this baton

Reflection on DHSCO China Trip '06 (31st May to 10th June)

2006-06-14T18:33:00.000+08:00

I was given the assignment of writing down reflections for the trip to China this year. After thinking for a few days, I've decided to write about this:

One of the many highlights of the China trip this year was the opportunity to play my favourite song: Qu Yuan Fu - Ju Song. It is my favourite song not only because its melody is very moving, but also because behind the wonderful song, is the great man, Qu Yuan, whom I really admire.

Qu Yuan was a great politician and poet in the Warring States Period (476 BC - 221 BC) in the state of Chu. During that time, because the State of Qin was becoming strong and dangerous, Qu Yuan tried to form alliances with the neighbouring states so that they might have a chance against the mighty and evil Qin. However, because there were some bad eggs who corrupted the Chu king, Qu Yuan was instead exiled.

During his exile, he travelled and wrote a lot of poems and songs that expressed how much he loved his country, and how sad he was that his country was going to get invaded by foreigners. While in exile, he did not resort to doing something silly like trying to muster popular support for better foreign affairs administration in the capital so as to pressure the king to make more astute political decisions. Instead, he did the right thing of falling into depression and writing touching poems that did not point out the flaws in the current administration.

So, when the capital of Chu was finally captured by the Qin army in 278 BC, he couldn't take the grief and committed suicide by jumping into the Miluo River.

Qu Yuan was a good minister who carried out effective political reforms, and he was also an accomplished poet whose poems still make people today feel extremely patriotic and sad when they read them. Nobody really seem to take note of that, but, in my opinion, his greatest accomplishment and what everyone should remember most about him is still his committing of suicide.

If us normal people, especially Singaporeans, committed suicide, we'd probably get hand-cuffed and all that because suicide is still murder according to the British Law, and then maybe our suicide will turn up in the media, but it's a very extremely small chance and only if our suicide was part of a disturbing social trend that was worth highlighting for the sake of social awareness for the general public. Nobody would even know our names because our identity has to be protected and all that.

However, when Qu Yuan jumped into the river, he managed to mobilize the whole neighbourhood to look for his body in the river, and then when they couldn't find it, they made and threw perfectly good rice dumplings that could have been used to feed poor and starving peasants into the river to prevent the fishes from eating his body. And then 2000 years later, we celebrate his suicide by eating rice dumplings and racing in dragon boats every duan wu jie (5th day of 5th month of lunar calendar).

So the lesson that I have learnt from Qu Yuan's story is that when we suffer setbacks in life, we should wallow in self-pity and depression and give up altogether. We should not try to help ourselves, nor accept any form of help to recover from the setback, but we should keep telling other people how depressed and upset we are in our poetry. So that when we do commit suicide, people may start to notice our works of art and might even create a holiday or two to celebrate our suicides!

...

Heh, the trip to China with DHSCO was much much more than just a song about someone who committed suicide, but I guess I just couldn't resist writing this. Qu Yuan's not just about the suicide I suppose, but it seems that's what everyone (not least me) remembers about him.

(P.S I hope nobody took my exhortation to commit suicide seriously...)

edit: (By nobody, I really mean nobody, except Chunsz...)

Welcome to NUS!

2006-05-24T12:36:00.000+08:00

"So, Zichun, where are you going?"

"Oh, I'll be doing Life Sciences in NUS, going to be a teacher... signed a teaching scholarship, you see..."

I almost always give this answer, followed by a joke or two about the civil service and 'students nowsaday', when generically asked about my tertiary education. And every time I answer, with a dramatically feigned air of altruistic resignation to a future life of suffering as a teacher, I can't help but suddenly feel a little uneasy. Maybe it is because I've not recieved any official word from neither NUS nor MOE ever since July last year. Maybe it is because many of my friends have started going for their medical check-ups at NUS already, whilst, strangely, I still haven't gotten any shred of news from NUS.

Well, in any case, I received a letter from MOE (sent BY HAND via Speedpost no less!) at long last two weeks ago on a Thursday afternoon. In it were various forms, and instructions to start applying for hostel accomodations and all that; stuff that made me feel even more uneasy, as the instructions all appeared to require some form of official liason with NUS.

So I started to dig up all the letters pertaining to my tertiary education that I've chucked aside during my busier days in the army, and with a latent sense of dread, I found a yet unopened, official-looking letter from NUS dated Dec '05. I tore it open nervously, and saw two sheets of paper that said 'OAM Form A' and 'OAM Form B'. The thing that caught my eye were the letters printed in bold at the bottom of the letter: 'If you do not reply to us by 11 Jan '06, we will take it that you are rejecting your place in NUS'.

I kid you not, cold sweat broke out instantly. I can't imagine how it is that I've not noticed nor remembered seeing this letter for the past 5 months! I experienced this heavy chill in my heart, very much like how I felt that time in the Biology examination hall for Block Test in JC2 when I realised that I didn't know how to do a single question for that exam; I felt like I was really screwed.

Then I noticed the OAM Form B (OAM Form A was a matriculation confirmation form) mentioning about the warm and happy family of the ENGINE FACULTY... I had initially applied to Engineering in '04, but because I got offered the MOE scholarship in '05, I had to change my faculty to Science. I vaguely remembered receiving news in July '05 about having had my course of study changed to Science from MOE, though I did not verify with NUS myself.

I became very confused. And my cold sweat temporarily evaporated. I convinced myself I must be worrying unduly, and that there must've been a mistake by NUS or something. I sent the MOE scholarship officer a good-humoured email to inquire about this apparent anomaly, and slept soundly at night during the long weekend.

So imagine the horror I felt when I found out that the scholarship officer was equally clueless about this issue. She sounded rather concerned, but she was really busy due to all the interviews for this year, and would appreciate very much if I could verify with NUS myself, and report back to her so that she can follow up.

I dialed what I deemed to be the relevant contact for NUS, got re-directed a few times, and finally reached the OAM office. After some polite enquiry, and having given my name and NRIC number, it appeared there was no record of me in their database!

I panicked.

"Oh, so you signed an MOE scholarship and had to change course? Did you reapply to Science this year? No? Oh dear... I think you're supposed to do that, otherwise I don't think you'd have a place in NUS at all..."

Cold sweat again. All sorts of ideas started cramming into my head. I started imagining this dark and gloomy scenario of me having to wait another eternity that is one year, under the ridicule of friends and peers and the incessant chiding of my parents and the authorities came into my head. How is it that I have allowed such a terrible freak accident to have occured?

By this time, I had more or less descended into a frenzied paranoia. I remembered making my way down to NUS twice last week, digging even more frantically into every single letter I had receieved last year, and calling up either the MOE side or NUS side once every fifteen minutes. I think the most important thing that happened was that I found a letter from NUS dated July '05 saying that they have successfully transfered me from the Engine faculty to the Science faculty.

So on the second visit to NUS, with that letter from them as incriminating evidence, I was handed an unsealed envelope, with the freshmen guide, numerous brochures, and the all-important official letter telling me in no uncertain terms that I DO have a place in NUS Science, that is, after they took the letter I produced into their office to process and photocopy. I was still in a daze really when I was handed the envelope.

"Uh what's this? So does that mean I do confirm actually really have a place in NUS already?"

"Yes that's right."

"Huh? Ok, uh, so uh, what actually happened? How is it that I got a letter from your side asking me to confirm my acceptance into the Engine faculty? (And how come I didn't open the letter when I first receieved it in Decemeber last year?)"

"I think they forgot to update the system about your change of faculty... but it's settled now, thanks to the letter you brought. (How would I know why you didn't open your letter when you first got it?)"

...

Actually, up till now, I'm still not really sure what exactly happened. How did I fail to open such an important letter from NUS for 5 months? Was there a cock-up by NUS? Did I have a place in Science all along, or did I actually crucially corrected an NUS cock-up at the critical moment?

I suppose I'd never find out, nor is it really important to do so, come think of it.

If you ask me, the most important thing is that, now, when people ask me about my tertiary education, I can answer them with all due irreverence and confidence, without feeling uneasy later on, and waking up in the middle of the night in cold sweat, hallucinating about not being able to find my name on the list during registration into NUS.

Well, what a way to get acquainted with NUS...

Nostalgia

2006-05-04T22:26:00.000+08:00

I have a drawer in my room which keeps all the 'sentimentalia' of my life so far; letters and cards that I've recieved from friends, angel mortal messages during JC, rejection letters from girls that I used to like (not kidding, I actually have rejection letters... you see, a simple and amiable 'no' didn't convince me, I had to provoke them till they had to explain what 'no' really meant in concise detail), and many other things which I cannot bear to throw away.

And then, when I reached the bottom of my drawer, I found something that caused my heart to leap with joy and nostalgia. Something I thought I've lost forever, because I lost all my soft copy versions of it, and I forgot that I had kept that ONE PRECIOUS hard copy version of it in my drawer. It's none other than our 2L History Drama Script! Yes! That one about the Singapore Police Force!!!

Back in Secondary 2, there was this event, involving the 4 'special' schools of our time, called the History Drama. Each school was to come up with a skit (some, like ours, despite being the smallest school among the special four, came up with TWO!) that had to do with any aspect of Singapore History. Then the skits would be judged and three winners would be picked. So, armed with lots of ideas, enthusiasm, and zero experience in stage productions, 25 (or so) of us produced and directed two ten-minute long skits, script, props and all from scratch in 5 months.

I forgot how I ended up being the scriptwriter, but I was supposed to write a skit about the brief history of the Singapore Police Force from Raffles' time to now. So I had this crazy idea, and took about 4 months to cough up 4 pages of rhyme. The idea was that the whole skit, narration and dialogue, was to fit seamlessly into the rhythm of the rhyme, without any breaks in between. So after I finished the 4 pages of rhyme, three of us went to a certain President's Scholar's house, and the four of us spent the whole day there coming up with stage directions that would fit the rhyme's structure and rhythm.

And then when we finally got down to actually rehearsing, we found out how messy the script really was. We had a hard time trying to synchronise all the stage directions to the rhyme. The actors literally had to run in and out of the stage in order to keep up with the rhyme. And because of the nature of the script, we had like... twenty over different characters (every character had an average screen time of about... 20 seconds), and there were only less than ten of us who were acting. So each person had to play about three to four roles, or more.

Luckily for us, we decided to record almost all the narration and dialogue, so all the actors needed to do was to listen for their cue, come in and lip-synch. Every now and then, though, there'd be actual shouting of some lines by the actors on stage.

So within a few weeks, we made all the necessary props and managed to somehow turn that mess into a proper skit. With regards to the props, I distinctly remember making this huge palm-shaped (as in our hand, not the plant) styrofoam fly-swatter that Chunsz (who was playing a policeman) used to swing at CK (the thief) in one of the scenes where the lines went 'Transformed the originally crime laden land/ Into a place under the strong and mighty hand/ Of justice, to make it a land of peace/ So that trading and profits will increase'. (Get it? The fly-swatter is supposed to be the Hand of justice!)

In the end, because we were one of the last teams to perform the play to the judges on the day itself, the backstage was extremely cluttered and messy by the time it was our turn. We could hardly walk. And that's the real reason why we didn't get first.

Nor second.

Nor third.

Most of us (I believe) from our class will tell you that we would've at least gotten a third or a second if we had started first, because we knew our final rehearsal was better than what we saw from the other schools. We got to perform it again to our own school for the next Monday Assembly, and that performance with the clutter-free backstage would've bagged us first prize.

Really.

...

So, it seems, six years down the road, what I remember most vividly about my secondary school days is this madcap adventure that lasted for a few months.

Well, to write extensively only about the History Drama would be a grevious injustice to the trove of stories that my drawer of letters and notes tell. I've been extremely blessed to have undergone such an eventful and truly purposeful education (despite the fact that our country seems to be making every effort at every turn to screw up the local education system) so far. Not to mention the people that I've had the fortune of knowing. This small anecdote about the exciting History Drama is just the icing on the cake; the tip of the iceberg. It is a joy just to think about those good old days.

So now I have a problem: To have had led such a meaningful life in my secondary school and junior college days only serve to make it harder for my future life in university and beyond to match up to the past; it would be harder for me to 'move on' in life. It was the best time in my life only because the present is not as good as the past. And should my life become more meaningful in university, it would only raise the bar and make my working life and beyond even harder to be as joyful. Surely everyday can't be the best day of my life?

And, would I thus wish that I didn't have such a memorable time and education in my impressionable years? Definitely not, for isn't it is better to have loved and lost, than not to have loved at all? Yet what is the point of tasting love if it is temporal, and would probably serve to bring more misery than joy? Surely there's an answer to this difficult question that nostalgia poses?

...

Sigh, I am starting to miss school, 2 months after I ORD.

Perelandra (Voyage to Venus) by C.S. Lewis

2006-04-26T23:22:00.000+08:00

"Then came the blessed relief. He suddenly realised that he did not know what he could do. He almost laughed with joy. All this horror had been premature. No definite task was before him. All that was being demanded of him was a general and preliminary resolution to oppose the Enemy in any mode which circumstances might show to be desirable: in fact - and he flew back to the comforting words as a child flies back to its mother's arms - 'to do his best' - or rather, to go on doing his best, for he had already been doing it all along. "What bugbears we make of things unecessarily!" he murmured, settling himself in a slightly more comfortable position. A mild flood of what appeared to him to be more cheerful and rational piety rose and engulfed him." (Chapter Eleven)

All those booklets that proselytising Christians hand out to people on the streets often, apart from trying to expound the message of salvation through Christ (complete with the funny cryptic diagrams), also says that in a Christian life, God is in the driving seat. It speaks of a paradigm shift in our worldview of religion; Christ is not our tool to our own personal endeavours, rather, we are to be Christ's tool for His divine plans. So, we are to seek His will and to obey His commands.

However, this posed an immediate problem for me when I first became a Christian back then: so how am I to know what is the correct thing to do, especially when the dilemmas I faced were not so clear-cut? Like for example, what course should I take for university? Should I accept the scholarship even though they did not allow me to take the course I had initially wanted? Should I continue to be so active for Dunman High Chinese Orchestra?

And then, of course, a tougher one: should I continue to go to church behind my father's back, and in the process, inevitably lie to him about my whereabouts when he asks? A Christian is called to fellowship regularly (Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another, Hebrews 10:25), which in today's context would mean going to church every Sunday. And yet, we are also told to "Honor (my) father and (my) mother, so that (I) may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you." (Exodus 20:12). So when your father tells to you obey his order not to go to church, or have anything to do with anyone from church, or else... you are, to say the least, stuck.

Especially when the 'or else' really refers to disownment.

Nevertheless, the answer is actually really quite simple and obvious. Obey both commands from the bible. Go to church, admit it and then... well... face the music. That's what happened to all the martyrs during the ages of persecution: they worshipped God, breaking the law, and then did not deny the charges, thereby accepting an often gruesome and cruel death. Daniel's story also comes to mind, except, he and his friends didn't die in that furnace.

God's will on many things is often very clear and leaves very little room for doubt. What usually gets in the way is our own fear of the price we have to pay. For in reality, honesty and righteousness are not rewarded terrestrially. Just look back at our NSF lives. The hardworking and honest ones get rewarded with more work and responsibilities whilst the lazy and irresponsible ones are punished with the dishonour of not being trusted to do any work at all.

So we come up with excuses and lines like 'I'm not getting a clear sign... if only God would tell me in a clear audible voice what to do, I'd do it without hesitation'.

What God really wants, is the decision to go to church every single week regardless of the consequences I will have to face, for a solitary Christian is usually not a Christian for very long, to convict myself to curb my ruinous addiction to gaming (not that DotA is inherently bad, but that it is to me, what 'just one pint' is to the alcoholic), to endeavour to flee from all temptations so that I can be a more 'holy' (and probably also 'boring' and 'unpopular') person; 'a general and preliminary resolution to oppose the Enemy in any mode which circumstances might show to be desirable'.

And until we can follow some of His more simple and intuitive commands like the ones listed above with reliable consistency, then will He start to whisper audibly in our ears difficult and counter-intuitive commands that has turned so many lives upside down.

...

So anybody got a spare room?

Crying in Public

2006-04-14T18:37:00.000+08:00

Although I am generally loathe to make a public display of my emotions, there are inevitably times when no amount of self-control and suppression can prevent the emotions from mainfesting into beads of tears that become visible to others nearby and sometimes even end up streaking down both cheeks. Here are a few tips on what to do when such circumstances present themselves to you during the most inopportune moments.

1. Prevention is better than Cure

Crying in public is usually preceeded by a moving or touching moment in a movie, among many other causes. Normally, when one is about to cry, there'd be the usual lump in the throat, a welling of pent-up emotions, or a deep depressing pain from within. If you notice these symptoms, or whatever symptoms you are familiar with that tells you that you are about to be emotionally moved beyond a certain point, then it means that you might just be in time to prevent it from happening.

Start for example, by thinking about how your friends who are about to see you cry will make fun of you for the rest of your life. Detach yourself from the situation you are in, and look at yourself from a distance, and normally, that would make you stop feeling like crying, because you often start to feel silly that you are about to shed tears for something like a movie.

Nevertheless, you may still catch yourself too late, and end up getting irreversibly moved and start to tear. Your eyelids feel warm, and you can feel tears brimming out of your eyes. Oh no!

2. Better late than never

NEVER, never ever move your hands to your eyes before everything is under control. And never glance around to see if anyone is noticing that you're tearing. Just carry on staring right in front as if nothing has happened. Resist all urges to sniff. Blink often, because blinking does not draw immediate attention to you, and it helps to make the tears around your eyes dry up faster.

Once you have it under control, then you can unobstrusively move your hand to your eye to clear whatever incriminating evidence there is that you teared. Naturally, one or two of the more irritating friends of yours will somehow notice you drying your eyes. However, they will be disappointed, because by the time they notice you, it would seem as if you were merely removing dirt from your eyes, and you would've sobered down sufficiently to be able to counter whatever taunt they throw at you. Right?

Still, there is always a possibility that you somehow lost your senses and end up really crying audibly, complete with sobs and sniffs.

3. Damage Control

Generally, you're screwed, but all is not lost! Now you have two choices.

First, you may want to excuse yourself from everyone's sight so that you may cry your hearts out in private. The damage has been done, and your friends would've at least heard you crying for a short time so that they can jibe at you sometime in the near future. However, they probably will not see you at your ugliest if you rush off to say, the toilet fast enough, and thus they'd not be able to say very much except that you started crying.

...

The other alternative, is to go all the way.

Start thinking about all the saddest things that's ever happened to you. And then let loose all your emotions and cry hysterically. Chances are, if you manage to cry and sob with enough sadness and misery, and make a big enough deal out of it , your friends might be traumatised by the extent of your being affected, and perhaps decide not to ever bring this issue up to you again in case you may be offended, and may even take turns to comfort you in genuine concern.

...

T_T

The Sacrifice

2006-04-07T15:41:00.000+08:00

I taught at a nearby neighbourhood secondary school last Thursday. Landed into two Secondary 1 Normal Technical classes first thing in the morning. Things gradually improved as the day went on; I taught a Secondary 4 Normal Academic class and a Secondary 4 Express class before the day ended.

The Normal Technical classes are a war zone I tell you. The school I went to actually employed 'teaching assistants' (it turns out they are old boys/girls who're waiting to go to Polytechnics for further studies) for Secondary 1 classes. And as I stepped into the first class for the day, there was a lady standing in the middle of the class struggling to say something in the sea of noise.

After announcing (mainly to herself) that I was the relief teacher for today and telling the class to please give me their attention and respect, she quietly came to me and helpfully explained that 'There are a few -very- destructive elements in this class. Do not confront or challenge them if they give you trouble, just send them away to the General Office'. And then she left the class.

If by destructive, she meant noisy, then the whole bloody class was extremely destructive, and yes they were giving me trouble, because I had to yell at the top of my voice before I could get their attention for a mere 3-5 seconds before I was drowned in the noise again. I wondered if I should've just sent the whole lot of them away to the General Office. And then there was the unecessary movement. At any one time, there would be at least two of them kids walking about in class or shifting their seats beside their buddies so that they could chatter away and make it even harder for me to even begin to teach them anything.

And then, of course, there's the famous 'eh, 'cher, 'cher, can go toilet?'. The same kid can ask to go toilet twice or three times in two periods (1 hour), and I don't recall seeing any of them drinking any water despite their yakking away through the lesson. I later found out that they went to the toilet mainly to 'wash their hands' and at the same time, use the water in their hands to spike their hair. So once the water on their heads dried, they'd be going 'eh, 'cher, 'cher, can go toilet?' again.

So there I was trying to teach them about population (the stop at 2 policy, free education, etc). I was supposed to get them to write a list of ways to increase a country's population. Immediately, shouts of 'premarital sex!' and 'don't use condoms' rang out. As I walked up to the ones who made the suggestion, they were already busily drawing pictures of condoms on the blank paper that I handed to them. Are these little monsters really only 13 years old?

Then all of a sudden, I heard a few loud bangs on a desk somewhere at the back of the class. One of the teaching assistants was involved in a scuffle with one of the students. Apparently, the teaching assistant spotted him playing with his handphone, so he wanted to confiscate it. However, the student refused to hand it over. So the teaching assistant snatched the student's bag from underneath his desk, and walked out of the classroom. When I inquired as to what was going on, the teaching assistant told me that he wanted the student to go with him to the General Office. So I was like, 'Ok carry on' and continued to try to get the rest of the class to do what they were supposed to do.

After another few minutes of walking around helping the students with their work, a short and stout man walked into the class in a huff, and the whole class fell dramatically into a deadly silence. It was the discipline master of the school. He entered into a tough-talking rough-sounding tirade for a good ten minutes or so. And this girl in the front row appeared to start sobbing after he mentioned something about caning. He left after threatening them to be silent for the remainder of the lesson, giving me an ambiguous pat on the back just as he passed me by.

Well, the class remained relatively silent for the duration that the discipline master was lurking around the block on his rounds. Once he left the area, the noise came back. But by that time, time was almost up.

...

The Secondary 4 Normal Academic class was better. They only quietly refused to do the homework they were assigned to do, quietly listened to ther discman and MP3 players while (if they were) doing their work, and quietly played with or watched movies on their handphones. All that (somewhat) innocent naughtiness has worn off by now, they've now matured into jaded disobedient punks who don't even bother to respond to your exhortations to do their work.

...

At the end of the day, as I was looking through some of the work the students submitted (3 out of the 4 classes I went to were assigned work to do through me), I noticed that among the drawings of condoms and horrible handwriting and answers, there was work that was done with a genuine interest in learning. A few of the Secondary 1 students actually bothered to take down very neatly, notes of what I taught them and wrote on the board on top of finishing what I asked them to do. And as for the Secondary 4 students, some of them diligently did all their homework; the effort they put in was very obvious through what they wrote.

Thus, it made me very sad to realise that such students are more or less condemned to a life with a sorry education and a bleak future. They could be late bloomers who are about to undergo an awesome intellectual awakening. Einstein was a famously late bloomer. He was so horrible in his mathematics when young, some of the mean things his teachers said about him are still being mentioned. However, the students I saw probably would never have the chance to discover any new theory in quantum physics.

Heck, it'd be a miracle for them to even rise above 'normalcy' to become 'express'! The longer they stay in the normal stream, the harder it becomes for them to learn anything at all. It's a vicious cycle. Well, anyways, there's not much a relief teacher for one day can do.

Why Not?

2006-03-29T21:52:00.000+08:00

I've found a gem in Douglas Adams' The Salmon of Doubt which I picked up in the library one day. Here is the small section that moved me so much that I needed to let the whole world see it.

...

"Why" is the only question that bothers people enough to have an entire letter of the alphabet named after it.

The alphabet does not go "A B C D What? When? How?" but it does go "V W X Why? Z."

"Why? is always the most difficult question to answer. You know where you are when someone asks you "What's the time?" or "When was the battle of 1066?" or "How do these seatbelts work that go tight when you slam the brakes on, Daddy?" The answers are easy and are, respectively,"Seven thirty-five in the evening," "Ten-fifteen in the morning," and "Don't ask stupid questions."

But when you hear the word "WhY?," you know you've put one of the biggest unanswerables on your hands, such as "Why are we born?" or "Why do we die?" and "Why do we spend so much time of the intervening time receiving junk mail?"

Or this one:

"Will you go to bed with me?"

"Why?"

There's only ever been one good answer to that questions "Why?" and perhaps we should have that in the alphabet as well. There's room for it. "Why?" doesn't have to be the last word, it isn't even the last letter. How would it be if the alphabet ended, "V W X Why? Z," but "V W X Why not?"

Don't ask stupid questions.

-From Hockney's Alphabet

(pages 9-10 of Douglas Adams' The Salmon of Doubt)

...

I think whenever anyone asks me a "How?" question, I'll still answer "Carefully". It's a lot more polite I think. Now I'm fully armed for my future vocation as a source of reliable and knowledgeable answers to a generation of inquisitive minds.

I'm going to start a Zhang Shao Han Fan Club!!!!

2006-03-23T21:40:00.000+08:00

I'm one lucky guy.

It turned out (if what I was told was true) that 3000 people queued up to get 500 tickets. And I was landed with FRONT ROW SEATS! FRONT ROW SEATS! Right under her gorgeous nose. Chee Hui was cheekily snapping away with his digital camera, explaining how he'd only have a few megabytes left, but he's going to overwrite everything with pictures of Angela anyways.

FRONT ROW SEATS! FRONT ROW SEATS!!!!!!!!!!!11

She was so pretty, so radiant, like the sun, that I couldn't bear to look straight at her face for more than a few seconds.

FRONT ROW SEATS!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

I wished I was standing somewhere at the back, with all those fangirls who came in school uniform. Then I could wave frantically with wild abandon at her until she waved back at me with a bright smile, and I'd short-circuit and go crazy and jump around and fall down and break a toe or something. And then I'd be crying at night because I couldn't sleep, because I couldn't stop thinking about that instant when my goddess looked into my eyes and permanently seared me with the brilliance of her smile.

And now, I'll probably be losing sleep anyways, thinking about why I didn't volunteer to go up and sing her a song, so that I could shake her hand and not wash my hands for the next decade or so, thinking about why I didn't wave to her when I was right in front of her, so far yet so near, why I didn't just care less about what the rest of the 499 of them behind me would think if a front-seater acted so crazily, so that I could lose sleep thinking about her smile instead of losing sleep thinking about not having seen her smile.

FRONT ROW SEATS! I STILL CAN"T BELIEVE IT!

Oh here are the photos, ain't she gorgeous? And unless you're going to say yes, you better not comment.

So who wants to join me on Saturday 3pm at Junction 8 and Sunday 5pm at Tampines Mall? Heheheh.

Why I like KTV

2006-03-20T10:48:00.000+08:00

From what I see, there're generally two types of people who sing publicly, ie singing in hearing distance of at least one other person. The first type sings publicly because he/she truly loves the song and sincerely wants to share the beauty and glory of the song, regardless of how badly he/she sings it. Normally, for this type of singer, their singing ability is inversely proportional to the extent of their facial expression.

The second type sings publicly because he/she truly loves his/her own voice and sincerely wants to share the beauty and glory of his/her voice.

I used to know someone from my camp who really loved the sound of his own voice. He doesn't really sing publicly very often, especially when he can be seen by everyone. Instead, he'd quietly sneak into the toilet while no one is looking, and then overflow the toilet with his bellowing voice.

I remember that I could never really make out what song he was actually really singing, but I distinctly remember hearing, from the corridoor outside the bunks, the intense sense of self-gratification expressed within the voice. He really loved the sound of his own voice, and this pleasure at hearing his own voice being echoed back to him (and out to us) in the toilet resonated very clearly in the tone and expression of his voice. I really couldn't help it, but the first words that came to my mind was 'aural *a**u**a*io*'. I told him that, and well, the thing is, it appeared to me that the only thing he seemed to be concerned with, despite my rather unkind remark, was what I really thought of his voice.

Hehe, I guess if anyone had a horrible voice, he/she wouldn't be able to force himself/herself to love it half as much as my friend does.

And then there was once, I was taking a taxi back to camp one early morning. As usual, I was feeling a little worried that the taxi driver might be one of those tired sleepy drivers (it must be really hard to stay awake and alert after one long night of taxi-ing around, life is hard). I was still nervously glancing at the old uncle in the driver's seat every now and then to make sure that he was not showing tell-tale signs of dozing off.

And then he started singing softly.

He was singing some chinese folk song with a very clear and crispy falsetto. It went on for about 5 minutes. And then he started a small conversation with me about his voice. Apparently, he was trained in some form of qigong in his youth, something called 'tu na gong', which allowed him to sing with 'seven different types of voices'. He could sing like a girl, with a consistent falsetto, he could sing like a deep-voiced man, and many more. A few of which he duly demonstrated to me while I rejoiced in the realisation that he was not likely going to doze off or grunt into sleep.

The old uncle really loved his own voice as well, because I couldn't really hear what he was singing, only that he was straining to let me hear the significant differences between his manly voice and his girly voice. I could almost see the glimmer in his eyes when he detected the slight look of amazement that I was trying to hide.

'If that Project Superstar don't have age limit, this old man would win it already. My voice, very tok kong one ok!'

...

Of course, there are people who belong to both categories, or not at all. And I love to irritate the crap out of the two types of singers as outlined above by singing crappily and loudly at the climax of their favourite songs, when the song is at its nicest, or the singer's voice is being stretched to sound its nicest.

Unfortunately, I never manage to irritate the people I go for KTV with very much, because they don't take their own singing so seriously...

ZL and Jan, it was fun, but that's about enough KTV I've had for the next 10 years. 6 hours leh, and only 3 people singing! That's like 2 hours per person! You're nuts!

Driving Tips

2006-02-26T22:43:00.000+08:00

Having driven for about 6 months intensively ever since getting my license in September '05, I now deem myself qualified to dish out some tips for driving effectively and impressively.

1. Never put both hands on the driving wheel. In fact, as often as you can, put NO hands on the driving wheel, and mutter to the passenger beside you 'look ma, no hands!' everytime you do that.

2. Do not slow down during turns. Turn harder to compensate for sharper turns. Accelerate if possible before and after the turn. Vroom!

3. Everytime you see a car trying to cut into your lane, hit on the accelerator and use your horn vigourously. You have to show those inconsiderate lane cutters who's boss. They can't anyhow cut into YOUR lane.

4. Train your right foot to step down hard as a conditioned reflex to seeing any long stretch of straight roads. And by long stretch of straight road, I really mean ANY stretch of straight road. Vrooom!

5. When on even roads, use gears one to five depending on your speed. When on uphill roads, use gears one or two for more power to overcome the slope.

6. And when on downhill roads, use neutral gear.

7. Before you move off, rev your engine to 3000 revolutions per minute at least twice, or until the car beside you notices you, and tells you 'let's race, punk' in sign language. Vroom vroooooom!

8. When on lane 1 on expressways, keep your high beam on to tell slow drivers in front of you to shove off to lane 2 so as not to hog your lane. If they're a little dense, flash your beam a few times to get their attention. When they see you come crashing into their faces on the rear mirrors, they'll swerve left.

9. Everytime you see a taxi, swear by the pain of death to overtake it within the next 100 metres, I mean, you're driving a 2400cc vehicle! Don't let that lousy taxi own you! Vroom vrooooooom!

10. If the passenger beside you is starting to irritate you by bossing you with directions and driving tips, remind the passenger who's in the driver's seat by flying over the next hump, making a few sharp and sudden turns, and practicing your emergency break at the next traffic light.

I love driving.

My Valentine's Day Eve Date with Yan Hao

2006-02-21T14:44:00.000+08:00

Miraculously, I managed to catch Corrinne May's concert at NUS after all! She decided to hold another unplugged concert on the 13th Feb for a smaller audience of about 400 people. The news was internally circulated within her website itself, and I happened to notice it about 12 hours after it was open. I called the ticket salesperson right away, and found out that here were only about 100 tickets left! In the end, I attended the concert with Yan Hao, and we sat in the front row at the corner. This led him to suggest that we snapped up the last two tickets of the whole show. Hehe.

And what a show it was! Corrinne did not have much to offer; only an overflowing voice, out-of-this-world musicianship, and come interactive banter with the small audience. Well, that was more than enough to blow the minds of Yan Hao and me, and most of the audience (I believe), away. Her songs and lyrics always seem to be able to find its way into our hearts, speaking intimately to us and making it easy for many people to identify with the contents of the songs (for those who bother to look at the lyrics carefully, hehe), despite often being simple and short.

As such, many of her fans (including Yan Hao) admire her for her musical talents. So do I. However, I admire her even more for her very strong Christian walk. In fact, I started becoming a 'fan' of hers mostly after I listened carefully to the song 'Journey' which she composed, as sung by Angela Zhang that fateful day on the bus around September last year (I wrote about it in a post in September '05).

I guess it's obvious to everyone she's a Christian by the lyrics of many of her songs (actually she's a Catholic Christian). However, I believe comparatively fewer people actually realise how strong a Christian she really is. If you ask me, I'd say that she was subtly giving out Christian messages here and there during the concert. And many of her songs reflect the closeness of her walk with God.

Well, I don't want to be misunderstood about two things.

Firstly, I'm not trying to suggest that the sole reason why I like Corrinne May's songs now is because she's a Christian. I've heard some Christian singers sing before. There are good musicians and bad musicians, and the fact that you're a Christian does not cover up your bad music and make it good.

I liked Journey (Angela's version though) even before I realised the actual lyrical meanings of the song. However, after I discovered what the song really was about, I liked it even more. Just like how a literature text may be asethetically nice to read at first, but only after you study it closely in context with relevant background information, do you recognise it's true beauty, and learn to appreciate it better for its brilliance. And most of her songs are like that!

Thus, I like her songs even more as a Christian because they reveal (to me) the human empathy and brilliance of the Source of her inspirations. She's such an encouragement, a reminder of the blessed and joyous life that He intends for all of us.

Secondly, I do not, consequently, wish to give this wrong idea that I think that the other 'secular' fans of Corrinne May are hence not as 'qualified' as me just because they do not see (nor embrace) the Christian aspect of Corrinne May's songs (or that they did not know about the second 'secret' concert on the 13th, nor have they ever tried emailing her and actually got a reply from her, twice, before, hehe). In the way the Chronicles of Narnia can and should be enjoyed as a piece of children's fiction despite its deep and very extensive Christian allegories, her songs can and should also be appreciated for being pleasant, soulful music in its own right.

...

Well, I'm just another Corrinne May fan. In fact, I think I'm quite a lousy fan, because, I still prefer Angela's version of Journey, even though she does not exactly sing better than Corrinne... Have I said that before?

My Entertainment Station

2006-02-11T16:52:00.000+08:00

I still remember a time long long ago, when radio DJs only did what their names implied; they played songs on the radio. Yes, they'd also give us a little background information on some of the songs here and there, engage in a little one-way communcation every now and then, by talking about the weather, and some of the more respectable ones would dig up indie gems to recommend to the general public, and influence the public taste in pop, music and culture. And they played songs on the radio.

These days, it seems that the job of a DJ is becoming more and more difficult. Now, they have to appear in public, and on television regularly (it's a common adage that DJs are DJs mainly because they're nice to hear, but very unpleasant to see), cut their own music albums, act in dramas, and tell stories and even teach philosophy and morals on air!

I believe the pre-requisites of being a DJ is a good command of language and at least a little knowledge in certain genres of music. In other words, radio stations would hire DJs based mainly on that, because disk jockeying is all about entertaining the public with music.

Hearing about DJs appearing on television, acting in dramas, or cutting their own music albums, or telling stories on air is somewhat amusing. However, hearing a clueless DJ try to preach about philosophy, purpose in life, love, and relationships irks the crap out of me.

No, I'm not talking about carefully planned radio programmes that some DJs come up with to have dialogues with audiences and specialists in their corresponding fields to discuss social or moral issues in society. I don't agree with all that I hear, but embracing different viewpoints after a civil discussion on all sides, that's called informed tolerance and harmony.

Nowadays, I keep hearing some DJs regularly dishing out 'nuggets of advice' on life, love and relationships, whether or not they've been asked. They could be talking about the song that was just played, and then they ease us into hearing a small banter about the background of the singer's life, and suddenly *BAM*, you are hit with an angsty one-liner about unrequited love.

Embracing and following some of the philosophical advices and statements that these DJs callously and irresponsibly spout for the sake of rubbing their own egos (it's always very gratifying to dish out advice to people, isn't it? Makes you feel so wise and mature no?), when they don't really care about the people whom they're giving the advice to (I believe most people don't really care about many people they see, much less people they DON'T see), that's called being a threat to society.

A DJ's opinion about life and love with reference to his or her own deprived love life in response to every sms asking for a song dedication is not needed. Probably the only opinions that are relevant from a DJ would be related to music tastes and pop culture. And even then, it takes years of work and experience before a DJ's opinions about just his or her own genre of speciality is valued and accepted by the people.

Some of the DJs are really quite knowledgeable about their own craft: pop culture and such, and due recognition should be given where it is deserved. However, it does not follow that their views about every other issue is equally worth adopting. Just like how Jackie Chan's expertise in making good action movies does not equate his expertise in the skills of acting (It's a Myth). It's just big egos.

Let us enjoy listening to radio for the music, and as for lessons in life, I believe many songs can speak for themselves. Just play the songs. And talk less.

ORD LOH!

2006-02-09T11:57:00.000+08:00

It's finally begun. The end of this necessary 2-year evil is in sight, but two weeks into my ORD leave, I'm beginning to miss camp already. What I miss most about camp is literally, the camp itself; I've stayed in that camp for almost 2 years already, and I've shifted bunk 3 times already. Yes, I've stayed in 4 different bunks in my camp.

I'll just talk about what I miss most in the first bunk I stayed in, the bunk on the highest floor in 'SP' Coy.

I still remember the first day I moved into Mandai Hill Camp... I was the only one posted there. Having taken much effort to get to know my fellow (JC graduate) trainees in Signal Institute, and even succeeding in clicking rather well (I think) with them, I was rewarded by being separated from them, and thrust into a platoon full of poly birds whom I had a hard time getting comfortable with.

I miss the way one of my bunkmates always tries to ease you into a comfortable conversation by flexing his huge muscles (most people say he just looks hard on the outside, but is all soft and weak on the inside), and adopting a tone that seems to make you feel like he's trying to gain something out of you.

I miss the way another one tries to convince you that Network Marketing (nooo, not pyramid scheme ok) is a viable and lucrative way of getting rich, by spending lots of money in that product, and telling you about the financial and business theories when you ask him about his net revenue after almost one year in the business.

There's this guy who greets us every morning (when he wakes up) by nonchalently sticking his right hand into his pants. I once asked him what he was doing, and he just replied matter-of-factly 'oh, I adjusting my position mah'.

Then there's this guy who's always being terrorised by another guy who wants very badly to squeeze his nipples, day in day out. He's the movie buff who thinks that Troy was a good movie (it sucked big time... right?).

And then there's this 'king of porn' who's got a picture (just the face) of a certain Japanese porn star named Sally something in his handphone, who thinks that Hong Kong comics are far superior to Japanese manga.

I miss many of the funny people in camp that made army life bearable, but what I really miss most are the countless nights in camp where I spent reading the bible in bed or on the stairs, and talking to Him, trying to reason out and analyse my insecurities, my problems and my worries, and ultimately psyching myself to learn to rest it all on Him.

It was a most miserable time. I was lonely (back then I had some initially trouble fitting into my platoon) and depressed. And precisely because of that, it was the most wonderful time, because I had no one else to turn to, but Him. And there is much Comfort and Joy to be found from Him.

If I wanted to go back to being a signaller in 'SP' Coy again, it would only be because I wanted to go back to the 'honeymoon period' of my walk, where He hadn't allowed me to go through any REAL trials with REAL consequences yet, but only taught and guided me continually through the bible and other books, to build up my faith and Godly knowledge in preparation for some of the difficulties I'm facing these days.

...

Nevertheless, apart from some minor inconveniences (like being squeezed dry and exploited till my very last day by everyone by [1] being made to do duty on 2 weekends and Valentine's day in February, [2] having to go back during my last 4 days to help my understudy clear up any mess for the closing of the financial work year and [3] being made to go back to clear my SOC before I ORD to increas the unit's chances of winning the Best Unit Competition), this foretaste of freedom from national duty is awesome!

ORD LOH!

Writer's Block

2006-01-21T20:55:00.000+08:00

Dear ~~fans~~ fan,

Here're some of my excuses for not having updated my blog as often as you've come online to check it.

1) I've been trapped in camp for the past few weeks (I'm stay in now again) and being squeezed dry in the process. One more week left to clearing leave, and I'm still scrambling with piles of receipts and tonnes of orders to deal with, and I've still got to do financial forecasts and accounting based on them. I've not even handed my account over to my understudy yet, nor have I booked a date for my dental FFI. Day after day of such mad scrambling whilst in ORD mood is making me tired...

2) I'm being burdened by various affairs of the heart. They're not making me suicidal, manically depressed, or wanting to devolve into an amoeba... (*snigger*). Perhaps not yet. However, I guess they are causing me to be unable to focus on writing the way I'd like to, efficiently.

3) I've been busy trying to ask people to go watch Corrinne May's concert at NUS on the 12th Febuary with me. Tickets are $28, $38, and $48. (Update @ 2135hrs: They're all sold out...)(SIGH!)

4) Actually, I do have quite a few things I want to write about already. Hopefully, I will be able to get down to writing all of them after I start clearing my leave after Chinese New Year.

...

And while I'm at it, I would like to say that I don't really like the idea of having a public display of my chatting with my friends. That is why I don't like to address anyone, nor do I reply comments often.

Here is my email address: confusian_99@yahoo.com

One fine day, ~~when~~ if I learn how to format this blog layout properly, I will probably get rid of the comments section, and put my email address out like an introduction section at the side for people to reply to me personally instead. (this layout was done for me by my friend)

I would very much prefer to correspond with people via email instead.

And as for my good friends who also blog, I'll try to tag more often at your side lah... And then I'll try to organise more outings. If I can.

...

Meanwhile, quit pressing me.

Crazy Taxi

2006-01-13T12:12:00.000+08:00

I'm usually a fearless person. Being good Christian, I know that my God is omnipotent and always in control. No harm will come to me, whom He loves and protect, and I will not be taken before my time. That is why nothing can ever make me tremble in mortal fear!

Except bad taxi drivers, especially when I'm in the passenger seat.

Just last Monday, I unwittingly hopped onto a taxi that was suffering from epilepsy. The cabby was a fidgeting old man who looked like he was way past his age of retirement. I told him I wanted to go to camp, and tried to explain to him my preferred route of travel.

I had wanted to go by Bukit Merah to Farrer Road then up PIE via Adam Road to camp. I didn't think he got what I said, because at a crucial juncture near the start, he was nevertheless still going to turn towards CTE. So I promptly stopped him from turning, and explained to him again my preferred route, as he jerkily slowed the taxi down in the middle of two lanes.

I managed to get him to get onto the route I wanted, but by now, the taxi was coughing. He kept pressing and releasing the accelerator in quick succession, so I was being thrown forwards and backwards repeatedly in my seat.

On top of that, his hands were fiddling with the windscreen wiper controls, as it was drizzling. He kept turning it on and off everytime the windscreen got a little blur, and sometimes he couldn't make up his mind whether he wanted to turn it on or off after his hand had left the steering wheel. So this resulted in the taxi swerving right and left as his right hand was not very stable.

I thought, perhaps, this was because he was rather confused about the route, and was still trying to figure it out. He did eventually figured it out at around Farrer Road, but throughout the whole journey, there he, still, driving like the taxi was suffering from tuberculosis. And drunk. He was not able to steady the speed of the taxi, nor keep within the lane markings for a few seconds, before the taxi abruptly slowed down or swerved. I kept looking frenziedly at the mirror and blindspots for him.

I believe his muscles must be getting weak already, and I could FEEL it by the way the taxi was running. He was driving dangerously close to the kerb every few seconds or so, and on the verge of knocking into the vehicle in front everytime there was a vehicle in sight in front. I tell you, I was biting my teeth and sitting as tightly as I could, in mortal fear evertime there was a sharp turn or bend, or there were some cars coming close.

And then there was that time, I hopped onto a taxi that was about to change shifts. Never flag a taxi that says it's going to change shifts, because the driver is probably very tired, and that means he probably needs sleep.

Alas, enlightenment came too late. We were already halfway to camp, and he was dozing off in the taxi. I kept glancing repeatedly at him nervously, intially believing (wistfully) that perhaps if he was aware that I was nervously looking at him, he would try to stay awake. I'm not Cyclops, and laser doesn't come out of my naked eyes, so he started nodding, and gradually veered right.

I tried to engage in some small chat with him to wake him up. That worked for a moment or two, as he suddenly jolted awake, and tried to reply me. However, after a few exchanges, he began to give monosyllabic replies. Then he started replying with grunts. Then he started replying with deep snoring.

I panicked.

...

Miraculously, I made it back to camp in one piece on both occasions.

...

I guess it's always fun to laugh at my own anxieties after everything has passed, and it turns out alright. For me, that is. Because, if you think about it, it's not alright if you were so old and weak to the bones; past your retirement age but still have to drive a taxi to get by. It's also not very funny if you had to work 20 hours a day just to get by, such that you're really compromising your own health and safety everyday due to fatigue.

Sometimes, I wish I could do something about all this. Yet, I know that there's really nothing I can effectively or practically do. Perhaps I could help that one old man for a day, or maybe even a year, but I don't suppose I could help every single poor old man in the world for the rest of their lives. Can I?

What then, can I do?

How I spent the New year's Weekend

2006-01-02T22:13:00.000+08:00

A lot of things happened this weekend. Actually, I suppose a lot of things are happening all the time, like gravity and muscle atrophy, it's just that we do't really notice them most of the times. Here're some of the things that I did notice this New Year's weekend:

1. The (not so) Great Malayan Road Trip

2006-01-02T22:11:00.000+08:00

My uncle decided one fine day that it would be a good idea to spend New Year's day visiting our great Grandmother (my father's father's mother) who resided in Mersing. Since none of us could come up with a better idea, about half of my father's side's extended family woke up about six hours after a huge chunk of our government's money was vapourized like fireworks all over the island so that we could meet at a certain hawker centre in Bukit Timah to start a two-hour long journey to Mersing.

Basically, the itinerary of the day was to drop by a distant uncle's shop, and to visit the homes of another distant uncle (where the matriarch lived) and a granduncle. Seeing the sparse neighbourhoods of terraced houses surrounding a small and short (lack of tall buildings) 'town centre', the words 'laid-back' and 'slow-paced' inevitably crept into my mind.

Quite interestingly, the difference in environment seemed to produce (somewhat subtle but noticeably) different outcomes in the behaviour of the young children (below 10 in age) in our (big) family. I couldn't help but feel that them children had a very jarring 'Kampong' naivete; a lack of certain social skills; a certain village gullibility and vulnerability that you seldom see nowadays in the young children in our city.

Globalism has not invaded Mersing yet. They're not like us Singaporeans, who're already so integrated and 'connected' into the internet and the mass media and all, we've sort of lost our innocence. And freedom. (the Malaysians fix up their own satellites to receive 'Astro' Channels, their version of our SCV, and sometimes, other types of international channels, something which we don't have to, and cannot legally do... *cough* censorship)

And of course, there was the grand old matriarch, who was so visibly aged. She was really bent double, and could hardly walk, hear, see nor remember. She kept ranting on and on (translated from Hokkien to Chinese, and summarized for me by my uncle) about wanting to burn coats for her oldest son, my grandfather (who's passed away many years ago before his time was up), and her own demise, even though they kept trying to change the topic. I suppose, when you sincerely believe that you're one foot in the coffin, many things don't matter anymore, and only death and the afterlife do. I wondered how I could've comforted her, or if there was any way to truly do so.

2. Countdown

2006-01-02T22:08:00.000+08:00

When I saw the footage of the throngs, zounds and legions of partygoers yelling and flailing so vigourously on the news, I was glad that I was not out there at that moment. I was not sure I would've been able to release one whole year's worth of expression of celebration into that one split second of yelling and flailing. I would've been quite miserable in fact. And to top that, I'd had have be happy.

However, I was miserable nevertheless, because I was trying to fall asleep after reaching home from Janise's Birthday party just past eleven because of the abovementioned trip, and I was not doing it very well.

I had a Happy New Year sms at about eleven thirty, another few Happy New Years slightly after 12 midnight, and a phone call at about twelve twenty from my mother asking if I was still outside and if I wanted a lift home. Then there were those expensive noises coming from the central district (near where I lived) at exactly twelve midnight. All of which jolted me from my bed just as I was about to enter the peaceful borders slumberland.

Well, then again, I guess all this misery is only going to happen once every year. I'll have to remember to off my handphone next year, and perhaps, sleep earlier if I have to.

3. Janise's Birthday Party

2006-01-02T22:03:00.000+08:00

The theme for her birthday party that night was 'Saturday Night Fever', but for us blokes from Hwa Chong, it should've been 'Saturday Night Tai Tee'. Actually, for a party involving 34 invitees from 3 different circle of Janise's friends and in the middle of her exams (in NUS School of Medicine, 'in the middle of an exam' apparently refers to the few months preceeding it), it was quite a successful and cosy party.

It was only because we were the smallest and least connected of her circle of friends that we retired to one corner for most part of the evening and played Tai Tee and Bridge, reliving the happier days in the generally unhappy and stressful Junior College that once existed.

There're no perfect parties, especially when the party involves 34 people. However, there're perfect opportunities and excuses for us to shirk the responsibility of our next outing before Wei Bin is no longer available, Janise. Heheh.

4. Dunman High School '01 Class of 4L/M Annual Christmas/Reunion Party

2006-01-02T21:53:00.000+08:00

It was truly the highlight of the whole ~~week~~ ~~quarter~~ ~~week~~ year marred unfortunately by a trip back to camp whilst at Jean's house to sign a silly leave form for the abovementioned trip to Mersing. Good thing I drove.

For the past eight years, our class has been holding an annual Christmas Party, most notably featuring an elaborately planned (somewhat...) Pot Luck dinner and Gift Exchange game. We're usually made to come up with a gift request, as well as coerced into volunteering to bring a food item of our choice that has really been planned for us to bring beforehand. And everyone's expected to do so usually about one month in advance. Unfortunately, I was the main organizer of the party this year.

Well, to be honest, I didn't do much, but somehow, everything turned out just fantastic. The turnout was better than expected, there was no awkward long periods of silence and 'nothing to do' and the teachers stayed quite long, busy catching up with us and reminiscing about the good old secondary school days. It felt really good to feel sixteen again.

I'm not kidding when I said 'feel sixteen'. We were listening to 'Why you so like dat?' (some comedy radio programme featuring a very funny debate skit) on the radio, two of them were wrestling (above is actual footage of the wrestling in action), the teacher's children and some of us were playing with sparklers. And fire. If the party was held by the pool like all previous parties at Jean's house were, someone would've been thrown or voluntarily jumped into the pool, like all previous parties at Jean's house.

I asked for six-packs this year, wondering how dear Chun Han was going to pull that off for me, and he did with six-pack batteries, six-pack Yeo's Soya Bean Drink, six-pack A&W Root Beer, a Men's Health magazine with hunk and his six-packs, and a wry grin. And that was just one of the many interesting and sweet gift exchanges we had last night.

I wonder if we're going to be able to pull off one more next year, with the same spirit and warmth and all the fuzzy feeling that I (and I believe many of the rest of them) went home with that night.

...

Meanwhile, it's time to start noticing gravity and muscle atrophy in camp. SOC (Standard Obstacle Course) is a coming.

Angela Zhang

2005-12-19T22:12:00.000+08:00

Your eyes contain the Pacific Ocean
Peril awaits those who venture
An unfathomable depth among the shimmering waves

Your voice is the Genesis
A universe is borne by your song
The stars but a mere shade of your divine melody

I weep in great desire to drown in your eyes
Like filthy algae which cannot bear to see the glorious Sun
So I drown in my own tears

I moan in great agony
Like a mutated Orc in the presence of an unblemished Elf
So I am ashamed to hear my own voice

If I was a god of light and beauty
Had I been Balder the Beautiful
I might have dreamed to win your notice by my looks

If I had the voice of Chorus Angels
Could I mesmerize with a tune like the Sirens
I might endeavour to serenade you for your affection

Alas

You would never understand
An incredible pining to adore has been inflicted on me
Like death it inflicts all

Though I seek your blessed attention for comfort
In you I will never find the cure
Neither your concerned gaze nor your consoling voice

Close the Door Behind You

2005-12-03T17:16:00.000+08:00

I've just devoured all seven books of the Chronicles of Narnia. In the end, I guess good fiction is always more delightful to read than good non-fiction. Or to put it in another way, we would always be able to identify better with a good story or account than a convincing and engaging argument. I've enjoyed both Till We Have Faces and the Chronicles of Narnia far mroe than I've enjoyed mere Christianity and the Four Loves (all of which happen to be works of CS Lewis that I thoroughly like). Which ones were fiction and non-fiction should be quite obvious.

I really loved seeing how Shasta's story unfolded gloriously to reveal the work and protection of Aslan at every critical juncture. A benevolent entity was always in control. I loved seeing how Bree was taught that he seemed smarter than the rest of the horses only because he was a talking horse in a land of 'dumb' horses, and I realised that it was so accurately describing the arrogant me.

Eustace's transformation from an obnoxious kid into another amicable 'Narnian' was also very magical. I especially liked the whole allegorical transformation of Eustace into a dragon, and his eventual 'peeling off' of his scaly dragon exterior to reveal the true him within, and by Aslan's own claws no less (Eustace was not able to fully peel it off by his own hands).

And then I read about how Puddlegum, Jill and Eustace muffed up the first three of four tasks they were given by Aslan, but still managed to succeed in the end because they chose to steadfastly follow the very last task. It reminded me that He gives so much leeway for us to fail, but we need only to chose it right just once, and it will be credited to us as righteousness; and the past and the failures would be forgiven and forgotten.

The Chronicles were written in the style of children's fairytales, very imaginative and exciting, but it's also a very intense allegory loaded with metaphorical portrayals of the nature of God, as well as our walk with Him. CS Lewis has such an astute understanding of human nature that I couldn't help seeing my own weaknesses and insecurities so vividly depicted through the children in the series, and concede once again that I'm still human after all, and in great need of some 'external help'.

Can't wait to see how Disney is going to pull off this one.

The Bewitching Hour is Arriving

2005-12-03T14:05:00.000+08:00

I've watched Harry Potter 4. I'm positively traumatised.

The main reason for my trauma is female. Her name is Hermione if you're a Hogwarts, or Emma if you're a Muggle.

She is absolutely stunning now that she's no longer a little girl. She was so gorgeous in that night gown that I almost wanted to hide in shame and self-consciousness of my abject ugliness. And when she sat there on the steps crying after the dance, my heart almost broke in sadness.

So why am I so traumatised? It is because I am thinking about the future.

Emma Watson is a famous celebrity now, but she is also an adolescent. From what I've seen, there's only been a few possibilities of such adolescent female celebrities.

1) Now that she's so famous, she's also probably very rich. And it follows that the food she eats would also be much richer than in the past. There'd hence be a possibility that as the hormonal changes start to accelerate in her, so does her gain in weight, which is all very normal for many post-adolescent females who live in a high-stress environment such as that of the highly competitive movie industry. And then because of that, she start to lose mainstream appeal, and disappear into oblivion.

Case Study: Charlotte Church; the last I saw her, she appeared to have put on quite a bit of weight. Or was it another one of those girl-singers? In any case, you don't really hear much news about fat girls anyways.

2) Now that she's so famous, and also so attractive (wait till you hear about sites like that 'bewitching hour' site that counts down to her 18th birthday...)(but I believe it's been taken down), she'd soon have all the Dick's, Peter's and Willy's clamouring after her. Who knows, with all that raging hormones, she might just succumb to temptation, declare that she's a virgin, and then break the hearts of millions of boys, men, and ah-peks by fooling around with numerous male celebrities and then holding a shotgun marriage to some nobody who happens to be her 'childhood friend'. And then she might jus start to lose mainstream appeal, and disappear into oblivion.

Case Study: Britney Spears, except, Britney hasn't really disappeared into oblivion... yet.

3) Now that she's rich and famous, she'd think that she's invincible. She does drugs, learns that she's not actually really invincible, and goes in and out of rehabilitation. The drugs ruin her life, and her time in rehab causes her fickle fans to forget about her. And then she loses mainstream appeal and disappear into oblivion.

Case Study: Drew Barrymore; except that she makes a comeback at close to 30 years old, and is still really quite cute even now.

...

And then there's that remote chance that against all odds, she turns out perfect. She grows even more beautiful, does not get into any hanky-panky, and masters the art of great acting, becoming a true superstar.

Case Study: I can't think of anyone... Ok I can, actually, but my point is that in the dazzly and glitzy world of showbiz, such cases are a few and far between.

Actually, I do sincerely hope with all my heart that Emma Watson will turn out just fine, and perhaps grow up to become a legend or something. However, my head tells me that chances are, she'll just succumb to the vested interests of the money-driven market, and become either (1), (2) or (3), or perhaps something worse...

Oh yeah, did I mention that I was also rather traumatised by all that dark and evil imageries in that scene where the murder took place? All that grotesque spell fiddlings, and the macabre masks and hoods. Yeeeks. I think Harry Potter's getting a little too dark even for big babies.

A GP's Purpose for Existing

2005-11-20T00:54:00.000+08:00

He treats illnesses,
Saves and improves people's lives
With medical certs

(There is a reason
Why some people write haikus:
They suck at poems)

By and large, the main reason why people go to see the doctor is to get a legitimate excuse to not turn up for work. Of course doctors do get involved in inspiring life-saving or (positively) life-changing experiences a la ER every now and then; once in a blue moon for hospital specialists; but almost never for clinical general practitioners.

This makes for a very monotonous and cynical existence for a GP after some time. The GP I went to on Friday is an old doctor. My whole family goes to see him when we're ill, or in need of the 'golden ticket'.

Like a warrant officer, the first thing he'd do is to engage in some apparently innocent small talk, only to catch me saying something he deems a grave mistake. He spends the rest of the (up to) twenty minutes ranting about the seriousness of my misconception. And art, culture, science and politics.

All I said one time was 'I think I've caught a cold'.

First he expounded on the difference between a cold and flu, and about how it was impossible to catch a cold in Singapore as it was not a temperate country. Then when he found out I studied biology in JC, he criticised my school, my teachers, and the education system in general.

He told me that Singaporeans are not educated. The teachers here do not teach, and the things they teach here are all wrong. The only place where they teach the right things is at Cambridge, the only 'good' subject is natural science, where there is but one decent teacher: the teacher that taught his son natural science in Cambridge (of course).

I think he sincerely believed he was educating me, albeit in a very condescending way. And I would've argued further with him, for I did not agree with most of what he said. However, I remembered there and then, the purpose of my visit. As well as the purpose of the people outside the consultation room waiting to come in.

As I left for home with the golden ticket safely tucked in my wallet, I couldn't help feeling a little sorry for that old doctor. For all the glamour and social status that society promises to bestow upon a doctor, the vocation is just another 'low-class' transaction of sorts for a living; my money for your medical certificate. (I suppose being a specialist doctor would be slightly better; my money for your downgrade certification)

It seems to me that making people realise how 'uneducated' they are, and then attempting to 'cure' them of their ignorance, on top their physical illnesses, is his way of dealing with the disillusionment of the pragmatic realities of being a GP. It reassures him of his social status.

Well, having said all that, I guess I can't say that I have anything against that old doctor. He could have been much worse, and much more dangerous. And in the end, it takes two to tango; I'm also guilty of being a pragmatic, task-oriented MC-seeker (it's the army, the army I say).

It's just that, I start to worry about some of the doctors-to-be friends that I have.

I bought Corrinne May's CD!

2005-11-10T20:08:00.000+08:00

She's amazing. Her lyrics convey so much with so little, and there's none of that nauseating angst in her songs. And she even manages to sneak in a church worship song (it's quite extremely obvious really) into her album!

And the best (and in many ways saddest) part of it all is this: from what I've read about her online, it appears that her CDs are but a glimpse of her brilliant songmanship. She's an indie. She's probably composed a gazillion songs which she only flashes out during some of her famously intimate performances in cosy (and small-sized) settings. Only because the lyrics are a little too quirky for the mainstream audience.

I've read that she once scribbled the bass notes for a new song she just composed to her guitarist. And when she ended off with something along the lines of 'will you run down the street naked with my name tattooed on your behind?', her guitarist asked her earnestly if those were the real lyrics of the song.

So, it's sad that we in Singapore can only get the 'crumbs off the table' in the form of her commercial CD. Hopefully, one day she might come back here again to perform.

...

But I still prefer Angela's version of Journey, even though she does not exactly sing better than Corrinne... Have I said that before?

Coincidences

2005-10-30T23:17:00.000+08:00

It I ran into an acquaintance while having dinner at Pasir Panjang Road on a lazy Saturday evening. She is someone I used to be hopelessly infatuated with in my teens. I'd rack my brains dry to think of how to make romantic gifts to give her, only to look back these days to see how cringe-worthily cheapskate and uninspiring they are.

Oh I still keep in contact with her, on MSN that is (and I still have her phone number I think, for decorative purposes). However, most of our conversations online usually end up with monosyllabic replies after a grand total of about 4-5 phrases (including the 'Hi's and 'Hey's). All of which culminated into a single wordless mutual wave of acknowledement when we met across the dinner table that evening.

Eventually, not a single word was exchanged, and I did not even have the courtesy to say goodbye to her (I shy marh). I just left unobtrusively.

I don't believe in coincidences; all things (ok, stuff like the above at least) happen for a reason, it's just that sometimes you see it, sometimes you don't, and sometimes you only understand many years down the road.

Yet, very often, we take 'coincidences' too seriously. Run into each other in the most unexpected places, or have siblings with same name, or have the same exact birthday, etc. And then we think that we are fated to be with that person.

I think this 'coincidence' is a sign and a message for me. For all the effort I've put in to maintain our 'acquaintanceship', the result was not even a word of 'Hi' or 'Hey' when we finally met 'coincidentally' in real life. For all the 'coincidences' I had with her, they were merely empty gimmicks to distract me from the fact that I barely knew her much more than what everyone else knew about her, and that the crucial 'layers of a sandwich' that made a relationship whole was all missing; a chicken toast without the cheese and the chicken.

I still believe that He's already planned for me the special girl of my life (and vice versa for her). And perhaps she will be the most unexpected and dissimilar girl I'll ever meet. Perhaps not, but regardless, all the requirements that matter will be present.

And then there's this chance that He means for me to be a bachelor all my life. I'm desperately praying.

Till We Have Faces

2005-10-19T21:50:00.000+08:00

How do I even begin to describe this utter, divine joy that I derived from (just) a hurried reading of C.S Lewis' Till We Have Faces? It is so romantic, so enlightening, and so rich. So much effort and time has been tenderly invested into the careful refining of the narrative so as continually surprise us with its subtle twists and turns, and yet come full circle to a complete (yet very much open-ended) close at the end.

The novel is primarily a retelling of the story of Cupid and Psyche, but added with a 5-tonne truck full of Lewis' ideas on love, suffering, and the divine. It was written as a narration from an extremely ugly woman (a hobgoblin, as called by her very own father), the sister of Psyche, Orual. Lewis' sensitivity to the female psyche would've made Arthur Golden and his Geisha look like some hermaphroditic abomination.

Orual finds out one fine day that Psyche, whom she so loved, had married a god, when all along it was believed that she had been 'devoured' by the said god on the holy mountain. So Orual tries to save her from the mountain.

What gradually unfolds is "an instance, a 'case' of human affection in its natural condition, true, tender, suffering, but in the long run tyrannically possessive and ready to turn to hatred when the beloved ceases to be its possession." (http://www.montreat.edu/dking/lewis/TILWEHAV.htm)

All of us has, or has been loved, loves, or is loved, and will or will be loved. All the angsty stuff about love that we've written, said or thought in our lives is testament to how ambivalent love can sometimes be; a selfless gift, a selfish possession; a boundless field of freedom, a horrible prison of envy; a sublime joy, a pitiful sorrow. The line between love and hatred is often so thin.

What is love that we should torment ourselves and suffer injustices for its sake and why? Not some big philosophical explanation or a callous theoretical calculation. But to experience, to feel, (and some say to know Him, who claims to be Love itself) is the answer by itself.

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God

2005-10-17T19:48:00.000+08:00

I was having dinner with an acquaintance who happened to be a smoker. After finishing the last morsel of food, he promptly reached into his pocket for his packet of cigarettes. Then, he tapped one end of his cigarette packet against his palm a few times to allow one stick to portrude out of the packet and flicked it deftly onto his lips. Next, he bowed his head slightly, covered his cigarette with one hand, and lit it.

"I hate those kind of smokers" the words came out of his mouth following the first puff of smoke, "they smoking like anything like that in front of children."

Only about five full seconds later did I notice this middle-aged man and his balding father who were happily puffing away beside a young child (who must've been the man's son) at a table across.

Then began the soliloquy.

"I remembered ah, there was once i kan'ed (scolded) a mother in Orchard Road. I was smoking, and there was this mother and child who were walking close beside me. I kept trying to change hand to keep the cigarette away from the child, but the mother keep pushing the child towards my cigarette. So I scolded her 'Eh you don't care about the health of your daughter one ah? Don't push your child to my cigarette lah'. Actually I really don't like smokers who smoke inconsiderately around children. I mean, smoking is my own freedom what, but at least don't smoke in front
of children mah."

In two short minutes, he has justified his habit of smoking, as well as morally elevated himself above other 'inconsiderate smokers', emotively referring children. Well, I'm very disturbed by how easily he condemned other fellow smokers without realising that he was under his own condemnation as well.

Smokers are generally unpopular among non-smokers because they infringe on their freedom to chose to breathe fresh air. It is the smoker's freedom to smoke anywhere they want, but when they chose to smoke near me, there goes my freedom to not breathe in the second hand smoke without having to hold my breathe (and in the process, look like a real cockster).

According to my acquaintance, smoking near children would be inconsiderate. However, if you think about it, how does the fact that I'm not a child make him less inconsiderate when he smokes beside me? By making a distinction between children and adults, he has shifted the goal post; he has lowered the moral standard so that he can be justified and even righteous according to his new standard (which really becomes not much of a standard anymore really).

'Sure, I may be an inconsiderate smoker, but AT LEAST I don't smoke inconsiderately around children. So COMPARED to those inconsiderate smokers, I'm much better than them. Well, balls to them!'

...

Actually, I don't have a grudge against the abovementioned smoker, nor smokers in general. In fact, I find him to be generally quite an easy-going and likeable guy, And personally, I'd rather have smokers like him who are considerate to children than smokers who are not considerate at all.

"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God". In other words, no one is perfect. Let us not forget that, and 'fail to see the plank in (our) own eye' as we try to 'remove the speck from (our) brother's eye'.

Besides, I'm seriously considering taking my first puff sometime soon. Whoops, did I just say that out aloud?

A Really Bad Week

2005-10-09T19:29:00.000+08:00

I was taking a bus home on Friday, miserably enduring the loud and annoying banter of a few sickening fatsos without the protection of my mp3 player. I almost let fly my fists onto the fattest flab's face. And for the rest of the journey, I could not help visualizing myself pounding his oily guts into a bloody mess.

I really wished I had a huge ice pick and chopper for me to decapitate him there and then. However, as I calmed down from my rage, I realised that it would not be right for me to just hit him without a reason. I would get into big trouble with the law in the 'fine' city that is Singapore.

I spent the rest of the night thinking of ways in which I could beat up someone, and yet not get into any trouble (or almost no trouble). Here are three ways I've come up with:

1

Put your bag in the middle of a pavement, and then go hide somewhere unobtrusive but where you can see the bag clearly. Wait for one sucker to pick it up, and immediately dash in yelling "THIEF! THIEF! DON'T RUN!"

If he starts to run, then he's all yours. Unless he's got very quick reflexes, usually the shock and awe would cause him to stumble as he tries to run away, giving you a distinct advantage as you take him down, and beat him to pulp.

At the end of it all, the word 'misunderstanding' would clear you of most of the more serious consequences of starting the brawl, very worth it in my opinion if you do manage to let loose several powerful pent-up punches.

If he does not run, or he happens to be a security guard checking for bomb threats, you will have to flash out your 'misunderstanding' wild card right away, and try again another place, another time.

2

Go to a pub or a coffee shop and keep a lookout for a solitary drinker who is getting drunk. Share a drink or two with him to get him even more drunk. Then forcibly try to 'take him home', loudly reminding him that he is drunk, and should go home to sleep already.

As you drag him away from the pub or coffee shop, take a deteour into a dark and secluded corner and start beating him up to your heart's content. As he is drunk silly, he most probably would not be able to put up much of a fight, guaranteeing a cathartic release of fury from you.

Alcohol often has the effect of causing people to forget what happened the night before. Pray hard that he can't remember what your face looks like the next day. In fact, pray hard that he doesn't even remember being pummeled last night..

3

Get into a fight with any stupid beng in the streets.

Simultaneously, your friend will call the New Paper, and give them YOUR side of the story.

....

It's been a really horribly bad week.

The Wonderful World of Jackie Chan

2005-09-27T19:52:00.000+08:00

That would've been a more appropriate name for the mess that was 'The Myth'. I'm about to reveal most of the crucial plot elements of the show. However, please don't spoil the show by watching it first before you read my 'spoilers'. It would greatly help for me to remove any shred of expectation you have for the plot...

So here are some things that occur within the plot of the story which reveals a lot about Jackie Chan.

He acts as a very very stoic and principled general, who is very very uptight. However, despite... or rather, because of that, a gorgeous korean lady falls in love with him, and then subsequently bares her bosoms onto him. Yes. ONTO. Marvel at how the script is ridiculously and unnecessarily twisted beyond recognition to encompass this single teenage fantasy.
He somehow lands into a... a villa filled with sexy Indian women doing some sort of yoga, and meets a wise old Indian sage who spouts verse after verse of wise nonesense, and in the process, acquire some fighting ability from a past life, and 'becomes one' with that sword from that past life.
In th process of running away from a division or so of policemen, he namages to get involved (well, almost) in a Bollywood-style exotic dance, as well as gaze upon the exposed hooters of a beautiful Bollywood actress. Of course, being the gentleman that he is, he valiantly transferred his shirt to her. Eventually. I mean, why should anyone else be allowed to see it other than him?
The general version of him commands a large and elite army of veteran soldiers, who are as fiercely loyal to him as he is to the Emporer. Both parties are willing to die for their superiors, and both do, in an unrealistically glorious manner. Almost made me feel like signing on.
Oh, and did I mention about that horse of his which could kick away flaming boulders and dispatch enemy soldiers with kung-fu kicks? That loyal stallion died too.
His best friend is an unscrupulous and misguided scientist who is mediocre in ability, whereas he is an uber-talented starlet in the world of archaelogy. The friend betrays him by using his talent to attempt to bcome the greatest scientist in the world. Naturally, he paid for his betrayal, dying a horrible death before the movie ended. Though, not before Jackie graciously forgave him in a show of his magnanimity.
The gorgeous Korean lady waits 2000 years chastily for him, even though there's an able-bodied general 'protecting' her all those long lonely years.
The show's climax involves the existence of a huge mausoleum suspended in mid-air within a secret, gigantic cavern, explained within the show by the existence of anti-gravity inducing meteorite fragments.
At the end of the show, all the baddies die, the good guys and allies are forgotten and the 2000 year old lover is buried forever. At the very end, Jackie is the only one alive, and remains in the centre of his universe, aloof and alone.

The Myth is not so much a movie as it is Jackie Chan's heroic, erotic, chauvinistic and egoistic fantisies all rolled up into a script. Stanley Tong must be a really good scriptwriter. He only took 4 years to arrange all that goey mess into something at least vaguely coherent and somewhat logical. I'd probably take 40, and even then, my script would still be so wrong.

Journey

2005-09-19T19:31:00.000+08:00

It was just another mundane trip to camp for duty, made less dreary by my new mp3 player. As the bus was going onto the expressway, Angela Zhang's version of Journey started playing. I was happily savouring Angela's delightfully clear and crisp voice, when I got a shock after hearing one of the lines in the lyrics that I have never really noticed before even though I've heard it quite a few times. So I replayed the song, and this time, on top of savouring Angela's voice, I also listened intently for the lyrics.

When I carefully listened to the lyrics this time, I was fatally moved by the song. Good thing the guy in front did not see me dying in my seat. Would've been such an embarrasment.

So after the song ended, and I came back my senses, I could only marvel at what Corrinne May (the original singer-songwriter for the song) has done for me at a time when I've been feeling so desolate and distant.

I seriously wonder what those guys were thinking when they picked this song for Angela Zhang to sing for some soppy (apparently) romantic Taiwanese drama. Did they realise what this song is actually really about? I mean, there are no blatant indications in the lyrics, but anyone with a basic command of English and is not drunk or stoned would've noticed something...

Still don't know what the heck I'm talking about? I'd ask you to go listen to the song and lyrics yourself, but I guess I wouldn't bother if I were you too... So here it are the lyrics.

Journey

It's a long long journey
Till I know where I'm supposed to be
It's a long long journey
And I don't know if I can believe
When shadows fall and block my eyes
I am lost and know that I must hide
It's a long long journey
Till I find my way home to you

Many days I've spent
Drifting on through empty shores
Wondering what's my purpose
Wondering how to make me strong

I know I will falter I know I will cry
I know you'll be standing by my side
It's a long long journey
And I need to be close to you

Sometimes it feels no one understands
I don't even know why
I do the things I do
When pride builds me up till I can't see my soul
Will you break down these walls and pull me through

Cause It's a long long journey
Till I feel that I am worth the price
You paid for me on calvary
Beneath those stormy skies

When Satan mocks and friends turn to foes
It feel like everything is out to make me lose control
It's a long long journey
Till I find my way home to you

...

The second last stanza.

Calvary is the place where an alleged crucifixion once took place. I asked my friend about this song later in camp, and he told me they play it regularly on radio (the Corrinne May version though).

Hehe, how cool is that?

Inspirational Quote of the Day

2005-09-12T19:48:00.000+08:00

"Help a man when he's in trouble, and he'll remember you when he gets into trouble again." - anonymous

I was listening to this sermon in New Creation yesterday, when my thoughts inevitably brought me to the quote above, which I found in the intranet mailbox when my upperstudy passed his mail account over to me.

The pastor was talking about David's three mighty men, and how they were considered mighty because they were very focused on the tasks they were given. How focused were they? One guy 'fought till his hand froze to the sword' alone with David in a battle when everyone else fled. The other guy defeated a Philistine army because they were trespassing the lentil patch (dinner) he was guarding. The last one downed 800 men with a spear because they tried to get past the door he was guarding.

Well, for a modern day analogy, it would be like successfully defending your camp against an entire platoon of invading commandos alone, whilst on guard duty at 3am in the morning. Then, on top of being called 'super garang', you would also be called 'mighty'.

And then, the pastor said something along the lines of 'So David thought, if I asked him to do something simple, like guarding the door, and he achieved so much, I wonder how much more he could achieve if I asked he to do something more difficult...'

And the first thing I instinctively said to my friend beside me was "Wah lau, kenah arrow."

Life's like that. You prove yourself to be capable, and people would tend to want to 'utilise' you more, where the optimist would say 'so that you can achieve your full potential' whilst the cynic would say 'so that he can abuse you for his own purposes to the max'.

The quote's a highly cynical viewpoint on this issue, but in the SAF environment, a very relevant one. However, being an eternal optimist wannabe, I try my best not to take this quote too seriously, and do my best in diligently accepting all arro... I mean, tasks given to me.

Until my CSM praised me for being hardworking today, and helpfully suggested with a straight face that to reward me, my ORD date should be extended.

I think it is time I meditate on the true meaning of PRAISE, and try not to recieve it as much as possible. People Rest And I Serve Extra, People Rest And I Serve Extra, People Rest And I Serve Extra, People Rest And I Serve Extra...

CatholicGirl-Jock-Mugger

2005-09-07T22:58:00.000+08:00

I am notorious for falling asleep in lectures and tutorials back in the JC days. My talent for dozing off in the midst of the most exciting of lectures has given my classmates quite a few memorable moments in their otherwise mundane JC days, none of which I share.

They've taken pictures of me lying my head on Huan Hui's shoulders, took turns to copy notes for me, and even wrote a birthday note for me, all whilst I was in slumberland (I think I must've slept the most on my birthday of all days).

And now that I'm (sort of) working in an office now, I find that I still have this gift. I eyes always feel heavy during certain hours, and I can't seem to stay awake the whole day even though I've been sleeping steady 8 hours for the past few nights. Heck, the number of hours that I am actually able to concentrate on doing the brainy parts of my clerical work can be counted with one finger, or two.

...

A CatholicGirl-Jock-Mugger is something I'm trying to become (vaguely). And for me to fulfil the 'Mugger' part, I've figured that I'll need to be reading with focus for at least more hours than I can count in one hand a day. And I've been wracking my brains and stressing myself out, figuring how I was going to carry on in such a lethargic state into university and still be a successful mugger.

And university lectures would surely be more taxing than my clerical work.

Recently, I believe I've figured out the reason why I always seem to feel helplessly sleepy during the day, especially after lunch.

Initially, I thought that my afternoon sleepiness was caused by my eating too much during lunches, and too quickly, hence resulting in my brain using all its power trying to digest the food. So I started eating more slowly, and chewing my food completely before swallowing, But all I got was a sore jaw after a week or so of trying.

Then I found out that if I had a heavy breakfast at the canteen and then a late lunch (when I just started to feel a little hungry), I was able to stay awake throughout the WHOLE DAY! Turned out that having a light breakfast, and holding out with an empty stomache till lunch time was the one that made me sleepy. Regardless of how little I ate for lunch on an empty stomache, it made me feel sleepy.

However, the solution would mean that I would soon grow heavier due to my heavy meals. And so, I have to start running more, thereby conveniently fulfilling the 'Jock' part of the mould I'm trying to fit into.

As for the CatholicGirl part, maybe I will elaborate another time... maybe not.

Nevertheless, (NS) the issue of (IS) prime importance (DOING) now, really is to make sure (ME) that my theory about the (IN) correlation between (I'M) a canteen breakfast and (GOING) dozing off during (CRAZY) afternoons is right.

Final GuardDuty 3

2005-08-28T18:06:00.000+08:00

'This is going to be our LAST guard duty... FOREVER!'

I announced gleefully to Ethan as I enthusiastically dragged him to start our rounds at 2am. I had explained that since this was going to be the last time, we might as well do it properly, like what those warrant officers always say: Do it once, do it good.

It was going to be our 'swansong' so to speak. From the August onwards, we would only be doing COS duties.

For him it was.

...

'This better be my last guard duty'

I told myself with a sigh as I took up my arms again at 2am in the morning to go for my rounds. I had gotten an extra duty given directly by my S4 as he went through my finance documents for LRI and saw that I had not written the date for one of them even though I had promised him that my documents were all fully done. Everyone emerged from the LRI with 8 days of off, whilst I came out with 1 weekend COS extra duty.

Wouldn't have been so bad, except Thomas cocked up, and did not indicate that it was a COS duty and not a guard duty to Randy, who happily planned the first Sunday guardy duty available for me. I did not have the heart to ask Randy to plan the whole thing all over again just for me, so Final GuardDuty had an oxymoronic sequel: Final GuardDuty 2.

Think I'm unlucky? Wait till you hear about Final GuardDuty 3...

It was a pleasant Friday, pleasant because Ethan had agreed to change his Monday COS with my Saturday COS so that I could go out for dinner with RJ on Saturday. Then during last parade, our CSM began making a disturbing announcement about having been forced to utilise his command authority.

It so happened that one of the guards that day decided to play punk. Having taken a half day leave in the morning, he refused to come back to do his duty that day, claiming that he had to send his grandmother to the hospital. As all the reserve guards had been activated already by then, CSM had spent the whole day frantically trying to persuade people to do the favour of volunteering to do the duty today, to no avail.

So he decided to draw lots.

No, I was not the unlucky one who drew the lot. I was not 'eligible' for the unlucky draw because I was doing COS only. This guy who'd done the last two Friday guard duties consecutively drew the lot. Now he was really really miffed about it, to say the least. And his unhappiness is actually somewhat justified, because this was the second time he had to don the SBO at the eleventh hour on a Friday evening.

However, he did the unthinkable. On the way up, he knocked the fire extinguisher container glass with his bare hands. The glass broke, and he left a trail of blood as he walked upstairs. All that in full view of our Commanding Officer (aka BIG BOSS).

That guy later had to go to the hospital because the cut was very deep. After a 'chat' with our CO, S4 decided he would activate someone from his own branch to do the duty that day.

So EVERYONE from S4 branch was asked to go upstairs to see CSM. By that time, 'EVERYONE' was only the 5 of us left. The rest of them had sneaked away. Of the five of us, one was doing guard duty the next day, the other one was COS for the day. So only 3 of us were eligible.

...

And that was how I ended doing a third final guard duty.

Here's what happened in episode 65 in Jewel in the Palace

2005-08-20T23:18:00.000+08:00

The Empress asked Chang Jin to 'liberate' the sickly Crown Prince (who was not the Empress' own son) from his numerous ilnesses, so that her own son, who was next in line, would take over as Crown Prince, that her seat of power and authority may be preserved in the palace.

Being the irresistably good, irrepressibly righteous and unbelievably benevolent medicine woman she was, Chang Jin naturally could not bring herself to agree to such a murderous act.

Unfortunately, she owes her life to the Empress, on top of the many favours that she's received from her (up until this insidious request, the Empress had been one of the few 'good guys' in the show; a victim of circumstance).

As if that was nto enough, the Emperor overheard the conversation, though he did not hear exactly what the Empress asked her to do. So he later tried to coerce her to tell him what it was, telling her it was an Imperial Order.

On the first occasion, she was torn between her conscience and her loyalty to the Empress, and on the second occasion, she was torn between her loyalty to the Empress, and the authority of the Emperor.

For both occasions, she chose the former, yet she did so without abandoning the latter entirely either. She chose, on the first occasion, to keep her conscience intact and requested to repay her debt to the Empress with her life, and on the second occasion, to accept the Imperial consequence of not betraying the Empress.

What makes me feel so strongly about this little snippet of the show is, what I feel, its relevance to what Paul said in Romans 13:6 "Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience."

Chang Jin valued conscience over the authority. She did not blindly obey her Empress and Emperor, but instead followed her conscience first, and so ultimately submitted to both her conscience, and the authority.

It wouldn't have been right for her to have agreed to help the Empress, but it was also an ungrateful and unfilial thing to refuse to help the Empress (for she would surely be unable to survive should the current Crown Prince ascend the throne) after what she's done for Chang Jin. So she begged to repay the debt with her life, so that she would not betray her own conscience.

Likewise, her conscience wouldn't have allowed her to betray the Empress by telling on her. Yet, it was only right to submit to the authority of the Emperor. So she told the Emperor that she could not tell him what it was that the Empress wanted her to do, and was prepared to pay with her life for this insolence.

Of course, she did not eventually die, otherwise there wouldn;t be all those romantic scenes with the main male lead later towards the end, and half the audience of romance suckers wouldn't have watched the show and it wouldn't be so popular.

In real life, she would've died twice over. Actually, she would've died in the first episode. Usually, there's no sudden third party who comes in preceding a flying arrow that deflects the executioner's axe to save the protagonist from certain death at the critical split second. The axe just goes down and the story ends like Kill Bill Vol 1.

John the baptist was beheaded most abruptly in the middle of nowhere significant. Stephen was stoned to death inevitably even after he was purportedly said to have looked like an angel! And Paul was crucified upside down most unceremoniously after all those letters and all that jail and flogging.

There is often a price to pay for doing the right thing, for following your conscience, for not doing unto others what you would not want done on yourself. Chang Jin could follow her conscience every step of the way (she did, every time, throughout the 70 episodes, except perhaps the single exception where she illegally 'zapped' some TOP SECRET medical records), I believe, only because of the confidence she had of being loved deeply. By her mother, by Lady Han, and by Min Zheng Hao.

How much more I could do if only I can always remember the divine love showered on me now, in the future, and forever more.

...

Right now, the price I need to pay is the withdrawal symptoms of abruptly finishing 70 episodes of the fantastic series within 1 month. Chang Jin... Chang Jin!!! T_T

Duct Tape! I need DUCT TAPE!

2005-08-14T23:28:00.000+08:00

I've just entered the scary world of nipple abrasion. After running 14 km at East Coast Park last Friday, my nipples were so sore, I almost screamed out like a sissy when the water ran down my chest in the shower at home.

Before the next training this Friday, I decided to do some research on this mammar... I mean mammoth problem. Looked up some forums, and found that the pros actually resort to using duct tape!

"In all cases, though, I find that I do best by using tape on my nipples. Currently I use just a small piece (about a quarter inch square) of quarter inch Micropore tape (available at ordinary drug stores). I have worn it through 50 miles (longest I have run thus far) and showers without it coming off. Some other tapes I have used have worked very poorly and others have worked well. Since it only needs to cover the nipple, one roll lasts a long time." - a certain Rocky Waters

By a ridiculous twist of luck, my father bought this new roll of sticky 3M brand tape for sticking on his Gu Zheng nails, wanting to try out a different type of tape other than the ones he and my mother normally uses. Turned out the tape was too sticky, and they just chucked it at one corner. Found it the day before I went for the run. Perfect for a sweaty person like me.

As usual, first times for me always screw up... A very good thing this Friday was only a 6 km 'leisure' run. The bleddy tapes dropped out before I even started warming up. Should've pasted it on vertically instead of horizontally...

Well, I bet that's enough information on nipple abrasion for a whole year! Or even a lifetime. Those of you who're going to train for the run this December with me, don't say I've not warned you already.

Man... just looking at that picture above makes me reel in imagined pain.

Cold Turkey

2005-08-10T20:58:00.000+08:00

I think I've found out why I've been feeling those pangs of loneliness and depression so sharply these days. It is the withdrawal symptoms...

I've never really told anyone about it before, but I think in my schooling days, I've been quite badly addicted to computer games. Actually, mainly Warcraft 3. I would be playing for hours in the middle of exams, all the way through my 'O' levels and 'A' levels. Sadly, I'm still very lousy at the game. And I'm really fortunate to have scraped through to where I've gotten. But that's not the point really.

I've not played any computer games (except those flash mini-games on the internet explorer while in camp... they don't count... right???) for over 2 months at least already I think. Not playing computer games has not made me lonelier, but it gave the time and space to realise how pathetic my life has become.

I spend the better part of my day in camp doing work with no incentive nor satisfaction (of which I will have to spend another entry talking about some other time), and is left only with a measly 3 to 4 hours left to myself at home daily. The weekend hours become golden.

Yet even if I do spend my time away from camp 'meaningfully', going out with my friends, it is but a few hours. Compared to 5 days in a week, 5 hours of time spent 'meaningfully' only makes the 5 days harder to bear.

Playing games regularly helped me to forget everything. During late nights when I could not fall asleep, and there was no one to talk to online or on the phone, and there was no one to go out with, I could always turn on the game and distract myself from it all. I did not even need to go out with friends during weekends, and furthermore, the weekdays would be easier to bear as well.

So now that I do not have this distraction, reality hits me like a brick below my belt.

And now that I'm forced to see this reality, I also gradually realise that if anything, this state of affairs of mine is probably going to resurface again when I enter the real world as part of the work-force in the future. If my job does not give me satisfaction, nor incentives, and I do not have any good acquaintances at work, life would be as bad. Except that there is no "ORD loh" to look forward to...

She's going to die!

2005-08-09T08:47:00.000+08:00

And my mother cried buckets as Lady Han confessed to a crime she did not commit in order to save Changjin. Good thing she did not watch the twenty minute melodrama that was the passing away of Lady Han on the shoulders of Changjin as they journeyed in exile. To be fair, it really was a very heart-wrenching twenty minutes.

By the time my mother started watching again, Lady Han was already dead and buried. By then, my mother had regained her composure, and was deeply consoled by the fact that Lady Han had at least a burial.

I had a short chat with her about the issue of death.

Personally, I feel that the living is always more important than the dead: Firstly, I believe the dead do not have eyes to see what goes on after their own demise; a grand burial for someone you've mistreated while he or she was alive is not an adequate compensation. And secondly, the well-being of the 'still-alive' is infinitely more important than the 'already dead'; life must go on, and the living must continue living 'alive-ly', that is, as opposed to living like a zombie.

So I was callously suggesting to my mother that Changjin should have just chucked Lady Han to one side, because she was going to die anyways, instead of wasting her own energy carrying a corpse-to-be. And a burial would not have mattered to the dead Lady Han anyways. Changjin should save her energy and tears on staying alive.

I suppose it is this kind of insensitivity that induces a seething disgust for pastors who try to 'evangalise' during funerals. For the pastor, it is only practical, because the dead guy (if he was a Christian), was going to go to heaven already anyways, so there's not much to be sad about from the pastor's point of view, and the bigger issue for him at hand, is the 'salvation' of the rest of the people who are still alive. Hence he simply does what is the most logical thing to do: try to convert people.

...

When Lazarus died, and Jesus saw his body with the weeping sisters, He did not say 'My friend is dead, but never mind! You've treated him well when he was alive, and he's going to heaven anyways, so let us be happy instead and focus on living properly so that we will all go to heaven together when we all die. Yay!'

Actually, what really happened was.

John 11:35
"Jesus wept."

...

And then He proceeded to revive Lazarus back to life. Well, pastors nowadays don't seem to do that already. Perhaps it's not so popular anymore. So the next better thing to do would be to mourn with the mourning; have some sympathy and empathy. And some PR awareness too. Weeping is a good idea if a pastor was good at theatrics, but otherwise, silence is usually the best idea.

There should not be so much callousness and recklessness when faced with other people's problems, especially when we can't solve it ourselves. It doesn't really help when you're going through a rough patch in life, and someone comes up to you and pats you on the back with grin from ear to ear and say 'Don't worry, I'm sure things will turn out fine', or 'Always look on the bright side of life', or worse still, try to evangelise.

There is a Divine timing for evangalism. Most of the times, it is not the right time. Least of all when I'm watching the soppy parts of Jewel in the Palace.

T_T Lady Han died...

ORD LOH!!! in another 6 months

2005-08-03T20:12:00.000+08:00

I got posted into 1 SIR midway through their 2 year cycle to replace ONE signaller who downgraded his PES status. Naturally, I was posted there, ALONE.

I had a hard time getting along with everyone in my unit, because I stuck out like a sore thumb being the only JC graduate among scores of Poly graduates. And now that I'm getting along fabulously with a few of the fellow clerks, they all start to disappear on me one by one, due firstly to the National Day Parade, and secondly to their miserable ORD leave clearance.

ORD LOH!!! for them... but for me, another 6 months at least.

And soon, all my closer confidantes in camp will leave me, and I'll be lonely and miserable and depressed again. Perhaps my previous bout of depression was just a foreshadow of the catastrophe about to strike...

HOW?!?!

...

Hehe, now I've got an excuse to be psychotic. I just read this interesting article about stalking in my bunkmate's copy of Men's Health. Maybe I should try doing that soon... but I wonder who...

VO2 Max

2005-07-31T19:15:00.000+08:00

It is a form of training for running, where the trainees are made to run a distance of say, 400 metres within one and a half minutes, five times consecutively, but with a break of 2 minutes in between. Said to train stamina; I think it trains your hokkien vocabulary as well. For those of us who can barely clock an IPPT silver timing for the 2.4km station, this 'training' is very shiong.

Actually, I enjoy VO2 Max training. I love the sensation I get when I forcibly try to muster up strength to start a sprint when everyone's slowing down. I think it's an adrenaline rush of sorts.

Normally, when I try to do that, I manage to maintain the sprint for say a grand total of three seconds, and everyone starts to overtake me again.

Just this Friday, I had the most satisfying dose of this adrenaline rush towards the end of my 12 km run at East Coast. I started picking up speed as one of my officers came up behind me and did what all officers are obliged to do, verbally encourage me to run faster. There was a good 100-200 metres up ahead, and somehow, I just kept picking up speed and actually managed to break into a decent sprint as I reached the finish line. Not much really, but quite a big thing for me.

Of course, I do get the mandatory slight pain in the chest and the 'everywhere aches' syndrome that causes people to slow down into a walk after jogging non-stop for extended periods. With the rise in the number of people who become a statistic after collapsing during runs in the army, the line between 'pushing yourself to do your best' and 'playing with death' is becoming thinner.

Fear.

Being a Christian, this fear of freak disasters seldom has a place when I try to push myself to my limit. (To be brutally honest, I think it's actually because I seldom really try very hard until I really feel like I'm going to die, but here's the ideal answer that I want to give anyways.) This is due to my belief that He is benevolent; that He will not allow anything untoward to happen to me, or for the cynic, because my holy Sai Kang (hokkien slang, literally meaning a ground deposit for poop, refering to menial labour) on earth is not all done, so I won't be able to slack one corner in Heaven so easily yet.

With this confidence, I find that I'm able to go all out to do what is necessary, to do my best without fearing for any 'side effects'. So I can run as fast as my treshold of pain can bear without fearing that I will suddenly drop dead of heart attack.

And in a small leap of logic, I can also go all out and do my work as diligently as I should in the office, without fear of being overwhelmed with more work and responsibilities than I can bear as a result. (A meaningful quote: Help someone when he's in trouble, and he'll remember you when he's in trouble again.)

Of course, doing my best at work and training without fear is not the same as hell-riding and screwing around in Geylang protectionless without fear. Not that screwing around in Geylang WITH protection is laudable.

It's just that, I no longer have any excuse for not doing what I think is the right thing to do. And by 'right thing to do', I really mean things like helping others even when I do not feel like it, spending more time with my family, holding back my snide comments, and trying not to be self-righteous about people whom I think work less than me. Yes, and of course, that includes being an open target to arrows in the office, and willingly without a grumble too.

Nuts!

I'm just asking for it man...

Why am I so depressed?

2005-07-27T20:15:00.000+08:00

I've had the most terrible Monday this week. I was carrying a heavy frown with me the whole day, unable to see any humour in the ridiculous amounts of work and responsibility I had in my work. I think I actually scared the resident beng in my branch into docilely obeying my 'request' to turn down the radio. He turned it off.

This dreadful feeling of loneliness and depression has been clinging on to me for the past week or so. However, suddenly, it just disappeared the next morning after guard duty.

Strange...

Desperate, I am.

2005-07-21T20:16:00.000+08:00

Just finished watching another gratifying episode of that Korean period drama Jewel in the Palace. I'm totally hooked. The script is good, the acting is good, the setting is authentic, and above all, I think I'm infatuated with the lead actress. My heart aches everytime the director devotes three minutes solely showing her crying in anguish, my spirits soar every time she overcomes another mandatory adversity, and I just melt when she releases tears of joy amidst a quiet smile whilst watching the sunset. I'm such a sucker!

I'm STILL crazy over Angela Zhang Shao Han (for those of you who've endured my waxing lyrical over her). After all, she sang the chinese version of the theme song for the serial. And I'm still considering joining her fan club, but this irrational urge is starting to die off, partly because of the new idol in my heart.

...

Reflecting on my recent sudden outburst of idolizing female stars, I realise that I've been doing roughly the same thing with all the girls I've ever secretly (some, not so secretly)(okay, MOST not so secretly), idolizing them, placing them upon the pedastal of worship.

...

I remembered having read these lines from the book of Job Chapter 31 in one of C.S. Lewis' theological works (I think it was Mere Christianity).

26 if I have regarded the sun in its radiance
or the moon moving in splendor,
27 so that my heart was secretly enticed
and my hand offered them a kiss of homage,
28 then these also would be sins to be judged,
for I would have been unfaithful to God on high.

Job recognized that it was in his innate nature to desire to idolize and worship objects and symbols. So, it appears that I'm no different from him. However, as any good Christian would tell you, the only One worthy and worth it of filling in this void in my soul would be God. And only then, would I be a complete and stable person, for my foundation is the unchanging and everlasting Rock.

Yeah, so I've gotta start going crazy over Jesus or something and act like overzealous Evangelists huh? And then maybe Zhang Shao Han will read my blog and see how 'complete' and 'mature' I am and starting emailing me. Alas, but by that time it would be too late, for I would no longer be irrationally infatuated with her no more.

Either ways, my idolizing would be pointless, except perhaps to satisfy my trivial whims.

Sigh.

I need to get out of the army.

About Guard Duty

2005-07-19T21:37:00.000+08:00

I've got an angsty lot to say regarding yesterday's last minute guard duty, but I suppose I'll have leave that till the weekend, when your moods are better, otherwise you might just vomit blood and die of cringing on a post-Monday blues Tuesday evening.

Actually I'm just procrastinating.

Anyways, they say that our army is evolving, and that the 3G, or third generation of technological advances is improving our army dramatically. I believe it is true! Just last night, whilst I was on guard duty to protect our camp, I got a pleasant surprise that proved to me that indeed the effects of all that technology and research was starting to show.

The night snack was beyond what my imagination could bare. Gardenia Vanilla Buns, SFI Chocolate Cakes and Pineapple Tarts, SUPER Coffeemix sachets, and above all, beyond belief, (hold your breath) ...

SUPER CUP NOODLES!!!!!!

When I told my bunkmate about this miracle, he made a 180 degree turn in his strong dislike against doing guard duty.

'Wah, sure not? Eh liddat I want to do guard duty already.'

Shame on those of you who say that our army is becoming softer and weaker. Has there ever been a time when soldiers actually DESIRE with a burning passion to volunteer selflessly for guard duty in the past? Now there is! If that's not improvement in the department of manliness, I don't know what is. Cup Noo... I mean safety of our camp against theoretical human intruders, here I come. I can't wait for next week's guard duty.

P.S.
I managed to take back four of the former items back to take a nice picture of as evidence (SAF Camp don't allow camera what), but I did not manage to save any cups of noodles. It was not ethical, especially when everyone was clamouring to eat them. I'm still learning how to position those pictures on this blog, on top of learning how to take pictures that will not turn out so bad that you will wish you were blind. As of right now, I can't seem to position those pictures below text. So until I find out, I'll be playing cheat.

Cup Noodles and the rest

2005-07-19T20:46:00.000+08:00

2005-07-17T14:48:00.000+08:00

I got dunked into the pool last night, commando style head first. I was totally caught off guard, as my friends set up an elaborate trap that would've tricked even the most vigilant strategist. They used a decoy.

Instead of talking about my feelings of this 'defining moment' in my life, as well as the array of thoughts that raced past my mind during that split second that Pinky yelled 'CHANGE' as I was happily carrying KJ towards the pool, I'm going to mope about my handphone.

As I plunged into the pool stunned, it took me about 5 seconds before I could react to remove my handphone and wallet from my pockets and fling it out of the pool. However, by that time it was too late. As of right now, my handphone would not turn on. There's no spare handphone in my house except an extravagent (and ridiculously hard to use) Blackberry gadget that my father has.

Due to my inability to utilise the Blackberry as a means of SMS transmission, I'm feeling lost and even more lonely now. And as I contemplate the option of getting a new handphone, here's a list of functions in a handphone which I find are totally unecessary:

1) Camera
2) Internet Connection
3) Email
4) Calendar
5) Calculator
6) Games
7) Address Book
8) Phone Book
9) Music Composer
10) Picture Editor
11) Camera
12) Planner
13) Internet Connection
14) Ringtone Selector
15) LCD Screen with colour
16) Polyphonic Ringtones
17) Camera (Have I mentioned that yet?)
18) Palm-top abilities

Actually I find these functions detestable. A phone is a phone is a phone. I don't see what's the point of making it an everything 'pao kah liao' device. And then when it comes down to it, you can't even make a decent phone call or send or recieve a message. And because of that, I'm starting to feel a little depressed. Was expecting a message or two. Perhaps they should also integrate a depression self-help kit into the phone, complete with drug dispensers in case of phone programme crashes that render even a simple phone call impossible.

Pinky, as you read this, please don't feel guilty. Just bring an extra set of clothes the next time we go to Jean's house. Heh heh.

Finance, SAF style

2005-07-16T11:56:00.000+08:00

I've ever heard this joke:

Once this guy went to this shop
'Can I have a can of dog food?'
'Uh, do you have a dog ownership certificate?'
'Oh I left it at home, so can I still buy it?'
'Sorry sir, I'm afraid not, our shop regulation.'

So the next day he brought his cert and bought the food.

Then there was another time he wanted to buy batteries for his radio.
'Can I have a set of batteries for my radio?'
'Uh, do you have your warranty card to prove that you own a radio?'
'Oh I left it at home... So I can't buy it right?'
'Yeah, sorry sir.'

So he came back ten minutes later with the warranty card and bought the batteries.

Then one fine day, he came to the shop with an inconspicuous bag in his hand and went straight to the cashier.

'Here, put your hand into this bag... yes, so can I buy some toilet paper?'

Approvals, acceptances, purchases etc. They never happen until we are deep in manure sometimes.

2005-07-12T20:42:00.000+08:00

These days I've been reading my friends' blogs quite regularly, and I'm starting to feel like a voyeur. Especially when reading those blogs whose authors really bare their souls in their writing.

I figured it's about time I start to join in the fun and malu-ate myself by writing immensely angsty and self-pitying posts in a deeply misunderstood and long-suffering tone. So whenever you feel too ridiculously happy and want to tone down your euphoria with some cringeworthy reading, just come here.

...

Actually, I'm just getting lonely. I'm losing touch with many of you, my friends, and starting to feel the drifting-apart effects of not having common-shared-experiences topics to talk about when I meet you online or offline.

I believe an exhibition of my everyday actions and thoughts may do something to ease this sense of insecurity that I'm undergoing. So whenever no one is talking to me online or offline, I'll write in my blog.

I'm a n00B. All you GoSu ones can start pouring suggestions into my mailbox already.

Have a nice day.

Disclaimer

2005-07-12T20:36:00.000+08:00

I suck at writing.